REPORT  OF  THE  FIRST 


RURAL  LIFE 
CONFERENCE 


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HEED  DURING 

NIvEks«vof 


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The  Summer  Session  of  the^Stai|g..<f^ll€ilSer‘ci 

of  Washington 

=  F*B  2 


182J 


JUNE  18  to  20,  1913 


PULLMAN,  WASH. 


Published  by 

THE  STATE  COLLEGE  OF  WASHINGTON 


RURAL  LIFE  CONFERENCE  OF  THE  STATE 
COLLEGE  OF  WASHINGTON 


Selections  from  papers  delivered  at  the  First  Rural  Life  Con¬ 
ference  of  the  State  College  of  Washington,  with  preliminary 
announcement  of  the  Second  Conference. 

Foreword. 


Dr.  E.  A.  Bryan,  President  of  Washington  State  College. 


Plan  and  Purpose  of  the  Survey. 


Professor  E.  R.  Groves,  State 


College  of  New  Hampshire. 


Educational  Surveys. 

Mrs.  Josephine  Preston,  State  Superintendent  of  Public  in¬ 
struction,  State  of  Washington. 


Farm  Finance. 

Honorable  M.  E.  Hay,  Former  Governor  of  the  State  of  Wash¬ 
ington. 

Cooperative  Marketing. 

Mr.  H.  C.  Sampson,  Secretary  North  Pacific  Fruit  Dis¬ 
tributors’  Association. 

The  Farmer  and  Cooperation. 

Mr.  L.  C.  Crow,  State  President  of  Farmers’  Union,  State  of 
Washington. 

Social  Aspect  of  the  Church. 

Professor  J.  F.  Nicholson,  University  of  Idaho. 

Program  of  the  Rural  Life  Conference,  1913. 

Preliminary  Announcement  of  the  Rural  Life  Conference  of 

1914. 

Courses  offered  in  the  Summer  Session  of  1914. 


FOREWORD. 

E.  A.  Bryan. 

At  the  opening  of  the  Summer  Session  of  1913  of  the  State 
College  of  Washington,  a  Rural  Life  Conference  was  held  at 
the  college.  It  is  another  evidence  of  the  great  awakening  of 
t lie  American  people  to  the  agricultural  problem.  We  move 
in  cycles.  Economically,  the  last  century  was  devoted  to  manu¬ 
facture,  transportation,  and  incidentally,  commerce.  We  had 
been  and  were  an  agricultural  people  and  our  aspiration  was 
to  become  great  in  the  things  in  which  we  were  lacking.  The 
best  brains  were  called  from  the  country  to  the  city  and  the 
city  became  the  place  where  the  strong  man  delighted  ip 
achievements.  In  turning  our  eyes  again  to  the  country,  the 
first  movement  was  economic.  It  looked  toward  a  new  agri¬ 
culture  based  upon  a  knowledge  as  broad  and  deep  as  that  de¬ 
manded  in  the  arts  and  an  organization  as  complete  as  that 
achieved  in  commerce.  Then  the  woeful  lack  of  a  sound  basis 
in  such  knowledge  and  organization  began  to  appear,  and  much 
more  the  relative  decline  in  other  elements  of  rural  life.  Sani¬ 
tation  in  the  city  was  far  in  advance  of  what  it  was  in  the 
country.  The  old  gam.es  and  social  life  of  the  country,  the 
cornhuskings,  quilting  bees,  log  rollings,  singing  schools,  were 
gone  and  there  was  no  adequate  substitute.  The  country 
church  had  well  nigh  disappeared.  Rural  telephones,  rural  de¬ 
livery,  and  the  automobile,  useful  as  they  are,  were  not  able  to 
replace  the  things  which  had  been  lost.  Financial  reorganiza¬ 
tion  in  the  country  had  not  kept  pace  with  financial  better¬ 
ment  in  general.  The  more  stable  class  of  the  farmers  were 
paying  the  highest  rate  of  interest.  The  love  of  country  life 
for  its  own  sake  had  declined.  The  old  were  vying  with  the 
young  in  flocking  cityward.  Now  it  has  come  to  pass  that  the 
study  of  scientific  agriculture  has  presented  a  new  field  of  in¬ 
tellectual  effort  and  achievement.  And  with  the  turning  of 
the  eyes  of  many  men  to  this  field  some  of  the  old  allurments 
begin  to  appear.  Along  with  this  and  the  rise  in  land  values, 
which  is  partly  cause  and  partly  effect  of  the  movement,  the 
farm  seems  to  give  promise  of  larger  financial  return  than 


State  College  of  Washington 


3 


in  the  past.  “All  things  work  together  for  good,”  so  they  say. 
At  any  rate  the  teacher,  the  preacher,  the  farmer,  the  scientist, 
the  banker,  the  statesman,  the  merchant,  each  with  his  per¬ 
sonal  interest,  have  come  together  and  are  focussing  attention 
on  the  rural  problem.  It  is  to  be  hoped  that  under  this  im¬ 
pulse  America  may  renew  its  youth.  It  will  not,  of  course,  re¬ 
peat  the  same  things  in  the  same  way,  but  we  are  yet  young  as 
a  nation  and  the  country  is  bigger  and  better  than  the  town  and 
we  may  have  the  spirit  of  the  primitive  country  life  adapted  to 
the  convenience,  thee  ulture,  the  prosperity,  and  the  wholesome 
living  of  the  twentieth  century. 


PLAN  AND  PURPOSE  OF  THE  SURVEY 

E.  R.  Groves. 

Meaning  of  the  Survey. 

The  social  survey  is  a  community  study.  It  originated  in  the 
city  because  city  problems  are  more  spectacular  and  apparent 
than  those  of  the  country  and  the  need  of  reliable  information 
concerning  such  problems  was  clearly  recognized  by  social 
workers.  Probably  the  most  famous  survey  is  the  magnificent 
investigation  made  by  Charles  Booth  concerning  the  social  con¬ 
ditions  of  the  poor  of  London.  Another  able  survey,  made  by 
Roundtree,  disclosed  the  poverty  of  York.  England.  In  this 
country  we  have  the  Pittsburg  survey,  a  splendid  community 
study. 

The  great  purpose  of  any  social  survey  is  accurate  informa¬ 
tion  concerning  community  conditions,  but  the  knowledge  may 
be  desired  for  different  purposes.  The  most  common  reason 
for  making  a  survey  is  the  advantages  that  make  for  com¬ 
munity  betterment  and  community  spirit  that  should  result 
from  such  a  study. 

Value  of  Survey. 

The  survey  is  modern  in  a  significant,  sense.  Science,  with 
its  eagerness  for  trustworthy  information,  and  business,  with 
its  emphasis  upon  fact,  both  in  these  days  enforce  the  value  of 


4 


Rural  Life  Conference 


a  careful  study  of  community  life.  Everywhere  in  our  social 
•life  mere  opinion  proves  worthless  and  an  increasing  desire  is 
felt  for  exact  knowledge.  Thoughtful  people  appreciate  that 
-community  progress  requires  a  scientific  basis  for  community 
comparison  and  competition  such  as  the  survey  provides.  The 
survey  appeals  to  the  rational,  to  the  practical,  to  the  scientific. 
It  keeps  no  fellowship  with  exaggeration,  mere  sentiment  or 
selfish  exploitation.  It  is  honest  in  its  searching  for  truth  and 
just  in  its  statements.  In  the  end  it  proves  that  frankness  and 
knowledge  do  more  for  a  community’s  prosperity  than  deceit 
or  guesses,  that  the  first  duty  of  any  community  is  to  know 
itself. 

The  Rural  Survey. 

The  country  has  every  need  of  community  study  ti  at  the 
-city  has.  The  country  problems  are  the  great  problems.  In 
forces  and  opportunities  the  rural  life  has  the  first  claim  for 
attention  and  conservation.  The  making  of  a  rural  survey  also 
-offers  a  satisfaction  that  the  more  complex  and  changing  city 
life  does  not  permit.  Indeed,  an  authority  on  city  surveys  has 
recently  said  that  the  city  survey  should  be  made  on  the  unit 
basis,  one  section  at  a  time.  The  rural  survey  gives  the  best 
possible  opportunity  to  test  the  results  of  the  social  study  by 
attempts  to  improve  the  country  life.  The  city  survey  has  been 
of  great  value ;  the  rural  survey  must  prove  of  even  greater 
usefulness. 

Kinds  of  Surveys. 

With  reference  to  content  we  have  surveys  of  rural  indus¬ 
tries,  specific  rural  problems  and  general  community  life.  The 
rural  survey  most  talked  about  is  the  study  of  the  community 
in  as  great  detail  as  possible.  There  is  real  need,  however,  of 
surveys  of  particular  industries  and  survej^s  of  some  specific 
part  of  the  community  life.  For  example,  I  read  recently  that 
one  of  your  leading  fruit  men  believes  that  the  apple  industry 
of  the  Northwest  will  suffer  unless  there  is  greater  coopera¬ 
tion  among  growers.  Of  course  I  know  nothing  concerning  the 
facts,  although  I  do  know  that  eastern  apple  growers  are  awake¬ 
ning  to  the  possibility  of  raising  better  apples  and  that  eastern 


State  College  of  Washington 


5 


state  colleges  are  preaching  to  their  students  the  absolute  need 
of  cooperation  among  apple  growers  at  every  opportunity.  The 
point  I  wish  to  make,  however,  is  that  the  successful  agitation 
for  cooperation  among  the  apple  growers  of  the  northwest  re¬ 
quires  an  accurate  and  constant  knowledge  of  the  conditions 
of  the  apple  industry,  which  can  only  be  obtained  by  the  sur¬ 
vey.  What  is  true  of  the  apple  industry  is  true  also  of  every 
special  rural  industry. 

A  special  problem  that  can  best  be  met  by  a  preliminary 
survey  to  discover  actual  conditions  is  that  of  the  consolidated 
school.  Difficult  as  such  a  problem  often  proves  in  actual 
practice  when  a  community  is  divided  with  reference  to  the 
proposition  of  consolidation,  one  can  hardly  question  that  the 
first  safe  step  is  to  learn  the  exact  facts  with  reference  to  the 
problem.  This  usually  is  not  the  step  first  taken,  but  it  is  al¬ 
ways  the  wise  beginning. 

With  reference  to  purpose,  the  survey  is  general  or  specific. 
If  the  general  survey  gives  to  science  a  greater  collection  of 
easily  used  knowledge,  the  latter  provides  fuller  opportunity 
for  the  practical  man  of  affairs. 

Preparation  for  the  Survey. 

A  survey  needs  to  be  made  with  forethought.  The  best  pos¬ 
sible  preparation  is  a  study  by  a  group  of  public  spirited  and 
efficient  citizens  of  surveys  that  have  been  made  and  of  the 
program  of  study  that  the  particular  community  or  industry 
demands.  The  ground  to  be  covered,  the  methods  to  be  fol¬ 
lowed,  the  organization  of  the  survey  and  the  uses  to  be  made 
of  the  completed  work,  all  need  to  be  carefully  planned.  The 
danger  of  persons  with  prejudices,  axes  to  grind  or  theories  to 
defend,  engaging  in  a  survey,  will  be  appreciated  by  anyone 
with  experience.  The  reformer  needs  first  to  be  the  student 
and  the  exploiter  must  be  converted  to  the  responsibilities  of 
serious  investigation. 

Organization. 

The  organization  of  the  survey  is  of  large  importance.  It  is 
possible  to  obtain  experts  who  will  take  entire  charge  of  the 
project.  For  most  places  this  is  impractical.  Indeed,  there  are 


f, 


Rural  Life  Conference 


some  real  advantages  in  the  survey  being  made  by  citizens  of 
the  locality.  Many  ministers  deserve  great  credit  for  the  in¬ 
terest  that  they  have  taken  in  rural  surveys  that  already  have 
been  made.  I  think  you  will  grant,  however,  that  the  making 
of  rural  surveys  ought  not  to  be  forced  upon  country  ministers 
and  that  the  undertaking  can  best  be  assumed  by  business  men. 
Men  in  business  in  rural  places  sometimes  make  the  serious  mis¬ 
take  of  not  being  really  interested  in  community  prosperity 
and  welfare.  Live  country  business  men  of  foresight  will  ap¬ 
preciate  the  opportunity  that  cooperation  in  community  study 
necessarily  brings.  The  very  best  results  of  survey  organiza¬ 
tion  can  probably  be  obtained  by  a  committee  catholic  in  spirit, 
representative  of  the  community,  not  too  large  to  work  and 
willing  to  delegate  parts  of  the  investigation  to  persons  best 
fitted  to  obtain  the  necessary  information.  The  educational 
results  that  are  bound  to  come  to  those  who  seriously  attempt 
to  study  the  life  of  a  rural  community  prove  of  unexpected  and 
permanent  value. 

Publicity. 

Makers  of  rural  surveys  in  the  past  have  given  too  little  at¬ 
tention  to  the  problem  of  publicity.  A  survey  is  made  for  use. 
A  rural  survey  needs  most  of  all  to  be  appreciated  by  the  peo¬ 
ple  of  the  community  that  has  been  studied.  It  can  not  have 
its  full  success  if  it  appeals  only  to  the  rural  sociologist  and 
means  next  to  nothing  to  those  who  are  personally  most  in¬ 
terested.  It  is  clear,  therefore,  that  the  rural  survev  needs 
modern  advertising  and  they  who  are  engaged  in  making  it 
should  study  the  problem  of  making  it  popular.  Merely  to 
print  results  in  pamphlet  form  is  to  waste  human  energy.  A 
committee  ought  to  have  in  hand  the  problem  of  publicity. 
Churches,  papers,  farmers’  organizations  should  be  urged  to 
help  make  the  results  of  the  investigation  known.  The  weekly 
paper  should  be  asked  to  print  parts  of  the  survey  again  and 
again.  Of  course  it  will  be  printed  as  a  pamphlet  for  free  dis¬ 
tribution.  Even  here  a  mistake  in  the  form  in  which  it  is 
printed  will  decrease  its  value.  Not  in  small  type  on  poor 
paper,  but  in  as  attractive  a  manner  as  possible  it  ought  to  be 
spread  broadcast  among  the  people  it  concerns. 


7 


State  College  of  Washington 

Respecting  the  Study. 

The  usual  rural  survey  is  of  great  value.  A  better  investi¬ 
gation,  however,  is  one  that  is  made  again  and  again.  The 
community  becomes  self-conscious  of  its  progress  and  confi¬ 
dent  of  its  strength  if  it  knows  from  time  to  time  that  it  is 
making  improvements  and  gaining  social  efficiency.  A  careful 
survey  deserves  to  be  continued  from  period  to  period.  A  rural 
survey  that  is  never  followed  by  later  investigation  must  lose 
in  scientific  and  practical  value.  The  problems  of  today  will 
not  remain  those  of  tomorrow.  A  rural  survey  reports  not  a 
dead  thing  but  a  living,  changing  life  of  human  beings.  Even 
the  best  rural  survey  will  lose  its  right  to  authority  with  the 
passing  of  time. 

Ground  to  be  Covered. 

The  purpose  and  character  of  the  survey  must  determine 
what  it  shall  contain.  The  general  community  study  should 
be  very  broad.  In  it  should  be  found  all  possible  information 
that  has  social  value.  Experience  teaches  that  one  can  not 
know  in  advance  how  valuable  a  certain  gathering  of  facts  may 
prove.  It  is  easier  to  discard  useless  information  than  it  is  to 
repeat  the  investigation  to  obtain  some  valuable  knowledge 
neglected  during  the  first  survey. 

A  very  complete  and  suggestive  outline  for  a  general  survey 
is  published  in  Gillette ’s  Constructive  Rural  Sociology — a  book 
that  everyone  interested  in  rural  problems  needs  to  own.  The 
Russell  Sage  Foundation  has  a  department  prepared  to  give 
information  concerning  the  making  of  social  surveys.  The 
Presbyterian  Board  of  Home  Missions  undertakes  the  making 
of  rural  surveys  and  have  on  file  excellent  rural  surveys  that 
already  have  been  made. 

The  state  colleges  are  beginning  to  cooperate  in  the  making 
of  social  surveys.  Cornell  University  especially  has  proven  the 
very  great  value  of  information  gathered  by  the  rural  survey. 
I  expect  soon  to  see  a  much  larger  view  of  the  function  of  the 
state  college.  It  ought  to  lead  in  all  educational  effort  for 
social  betterment.  Without  doubt  the  state  college  of  the 
future  will  be  prepared  to  direct  the  rural  survey  investiga- 


8 


Rural  Life  Conference 


lions.  We  are  training  men  at  New  Hampshire  State  College 
to  take  an  interest  in  community  survey  service  and  the  results 
of  some  of  the  community  studies  already  made  by  the  stu¬ 
dents  are  surprisingly  valuable. 

The  Survey  in  Washington 

As  I  speak  I  am  impressed  with  the  importance  of  the  sur¬ 
vey  in  the  great  Northwest.  The  romance  of  a  great  empire  in 
construction  captivates  one’s  attention.  You  have  been  drawn 
by  the  strong,  compelling  human  instincts  to  the  last  frontier 
of  culture.  Westward  you  face  the  most  ancient  of  civiliza¬ 
tions.  Eastward  stretch  the  older  states  and  nations  from 
which  you  have  come.  You  are  cosmopolitan  in  the  best  sense 
and  this  is  the  greatest  of  all  your  resources  as  a  people,  for 
from  the  mixing  of  the  ambitious  and  brave  spirits  of  many 
races  has  always  issued  the  greatest  progress.  You  are  free 
to  learn  from  the  mistakes  of  older  communities.  You  are  not 
as  yet  entangled  in  the  social  traditions  that  retard  progress 
in  the  east.  You  occupy  a  rich  possession  in  the  most  splendid 
century  in  man’s  long  history.  What  a  magnificent  oppor¬ 
tunity,  what  a  solemn  duy  to  plan  progress  with  forethought ! 
Hardly  has  this  been  done  ever  before.  Surely  in  the  making 
of  progress  with  forethought  you  will  find  real  need  of  the 
social  survey. 


EDUCATIONAL  SURVEYS. 

Josephine  Preston. 

A  survey  is  the  application  of  thoroughly  scientific  methods 
to  social  and  economic  phenomena,  to  secure  data  upon  which 
o  base  a  scientific  program  for  the  increase  of  human  and  in¬ 
stitutional  efficiency. 

Growth  of  the  Survey  Idea.  In  part  the  survey  idea  is  the 
outgrowth  of  scientific  management  in  business  as  developed 
by  Frederic  W.  Taylor.  Many  people  feel  that  our  school  sys¬ 
tem  and  state  institutions  need  scientific  management  as  well 
as  business  needs  it. 


State  College  of  Washington 


Scientific  management  depends  upon  the  securing  of  com¬ 
plete  information  regarding  the  needs  and  possibilities  of  a 
business.  As  the  test  of  efficiency  was  applied  to  business 
establishments  of  great  magnitude,  so  the  test  of  efficiency 
has  later  been  applied  to  all  human  activities  in  which  men  are 
banded  together  and  organized  for  common  purposes.  As  a 
result  the  survey  idea  has  arisen. 

Application.  The  Country  Life  Commission  in  its  extended 
hearings,  investigations,  and  inquiries  regarding  country  life 
was  virtually  working  along  the  line  of  a  survey.  The  later 
extension  of  the  Country  Life  movement  has  employed  the 
survey  method  in  its  entirety.  And  now  it  is  being  extended 
to  other  fields. 

Probably  the  first  place  in  which  the  survey  was  used  so  as 
to  gain  national  prominence  was  in  the  great  survey  of  the 
city  of  Pittsburg,  made  and  conducted  by  social  experts  in  the 
year  1909,  I  believe.  The  portrayal  of  conditions  that  existed 
in  that  great  steel  manufacturing  city,  as  revealed  in  that  sur¬ 
vey,  showing  the  great  social  needs  of  the  people,  was  a  demon¬ 
stration  of  the  great  power  of  the  survey.  In  fact  it  was  from 
this  incident  that  the  magazine  formerly  known  as  ‘ 4  Charities 
and  Commons”  changed  its  title  to  “The  Survey”  and  has 
developed  into  a  great  social  dynamic. 

The  Men  and  Religion  Forward  Movement,  which  swept 
over  the  country  last  year,  was  an  illustration  of  the  use  of  the 
survey  for  religious  purposes.  There  were  35  pivotal  cities 
selected  for  work  by  the  directors  of  the  movement.  But  the 
first  condition  was  that  a  complete  social  and  religious  survey 
should  be  made  of  the  city  before  the  team  should  visit  the 
city.  This  was  necessary  before  they  could  suggest  any  rational 
plan  for  the  city’s  betterment. 

Some  of  the  churches  have  established  organizations  for  the 
improvement  of  religious  conditions  in  rural  communities.  OiV 
this  occasion,  at  this  meeting  we  find  our  State  College  of  the 
State  of  Washington  leading  on  a  state  movement  to  interest 
the  ministers  and  rural  people,  as  well  as  the  educators  of  this 
state  in  the  rural  church  development.  What  ever  we  do  we 


10 


Rural  Life  Conference 


.know  that  first  we  must  work  out  some  plan  for  a  survey  of 
the  work  and  scope  of  the  rural  church  and  then  decide  upon 
a  plan  to  do  team  work  towards  its  development  and  larger 
growth. 

Educational  Surveys.  The  educational  field  has  not  been 
overlooked  in  this  endeavor  to  discover  ourselves  as  a  people. 
A  few  years  ago  Greenwich,  Conn.,  employed  experts  to  visit 
the  city  and  make  a  survey  of  the  whole  educational  scheme. 
The  experts  investigated  the  business  and  equipment,  the  sani¬ 
tation,  the  courses  and  methods  of  school  administration,  and 
the  financial  system  of  the  city  schools.  After  their  work 
was  finished  a  great  exhibit  was  held,  in  which  conditions  as 
found  by  the  survey  were  set  forth  to  the  people  by  graphic 
means,  such  as  charts,  etc.  The  concrete  result  was  such  that 
the  people  were  so  impressed  that  they  adopted  the  improve¬ 
ments  that  they  plainly  needed  and  cheerfully  voted  for  higher 
taxes  in  order  to  carry  out  the  needed  reforms. 

Other  cities  have  conducted  educational  surveys,  but  Green¬ 
wich,  Conn.,  is  a  splendid  example  of  the  method  and  of  the 
result.  Our  states  are  heeding  the  “Call  of  the  Survey”  and 
are  planning  for  them  in  the  respective  states. 

At  present  there  is  being  conducted  the  educational  survey 
of  the  whole  state  of  Ohio  and  soon  there  will  be  initiated  a 
survey  of  the  educational  institutions  of  Vermont.  The  plan 
is  to  investigate  the  school  systems  of  the  whole  state  in  order 
to  develop  a  harmonious  school  system  in  each  state. 

Dr.  AVinship,  one  of  our  prominent  lecturers  and  educators 
of  the  United  States  says  in  part  in  a  recent  number  of  the 
Journal  of  Education  concerning  Rhode  Island:  “Rhode 
Island,  already  one  of  the  first  ten  states  in  the  union  in  the 
Sage  Foundation  scale  and  first  in  the  length  of  the  school 
year,  has  long  been  in  the  forefront  educationally.  The  State 
Superintendent  in  his  automobile  can  go  to  any  part  of  the 
state  before  schools  open  in  the  morning  and  go  home  before 
they  close  in  the  afternoon.  This  is  a  great  asset  when  it  comes 
to  skilled  supervision.  Rhode  Island  is  an  eminently  prosper¬ 
ous  state  withal,  so  that  salaries  are  good.  Rhode  Island  was 


State  College  of  Washington 


11 


the  first  or  second  state  to  provide  pensions  for  its  teachers, 
setting  a  pace  as  to  time  and  a  standard  as  to  law  which  is 
being  followed  in  the  attempts  of  the  other  states  to  enact 
pension  laws.  It  was  the  first  state  to  have  a  ‘survey’  of  the 
public  schools  of  the  United  States.  It  may  be  a  little  late  to 
report  it,  but  some  70  years  ago  the  legislature  of  Rhode  Island 
made  an  appropriation  for  a  survey  of  the  educational  con¬ 
ditions  by  Henry  Barnard.  His  report  was  made  to  the  legis¬ 
lature  in  a  public  meeting  in  the  Representative  Hall.  The 
repor  was  accepted  by  the  legislature  by  a  virtually  unanimous 
vote.  A  state  department  of  education  was  established  and 
Dr.  Henry  Barnard  was  elected  as  State  Commissioner  of  Edu¬ 
cation.  ’  ’ 

The  Agencies  that  have  conducted  most  of  the  educational 
surveys  up  to  the  present  time  are:  The  Russel  Sage  Founda¬ 
tion,  The  Bureau  of  Municipal  Research,  the  Carnegie  Founda¬ 
tion. 

One  fundamental  idea  of  the  survey  is  that  investigators 
begin  their  work  to  discover  the  truth,  not  to  seek  data  that 
will  prove  their  own  theories  of  education. 

Educational  Surveys  in  Washington  have  not  as  yet  been 
begun,  but  it  is  hoped  that  the  State  Department  of  Education 
will  be  able  to  carry  out  some  such  surveys  during  the  present 

biennium. 


FARM  FINANCE. 

M.  E.  Hay. 

As  we  advance  in  civilization  and  knowledge  each  genera¬ 
tion  has  its  peculiar  problems  to  meet  and  to  solve.  This  gen¬ 
eration  has  solved  many  questions  effecting  our  prosperity,, 
past  and  present.  As  our  social  structure  becomes  more  and 
more  complex,  new  conditions  arise  demanding  that  they  be 
properly  solved. 

We  have  now  confronting  us  one  great  problem  which  must 
be  solved  if  we  are  to  enjoy  the  prosperity  and  continue  our 
growth  and  development  as  we  have  in  the  past,  and  that  is. 


12 


Rural  Life  Conference 


the  tendency  of  our  people  to  leave  the  farm  and  go  to  the 
cities  to  reside.  In  my  estimation  there  are  but  few  questions 
effecting  us  that  require  more  careful  consideration  than  the 
growth  of  our  urban  population,  which  is  constantly  going  on 
at  the  expense  of  rural  sections.  If  one  portion  of  our  country 
is  growing  in  population  and  another  immediately  adjoining, 
equally  as  well  situated,  is  becoming  depopulated  to  the  ad¬ 
vantage  of  the  other,  then  there  is  some  reason  therefor  that 
requires  careful  consideration  and  attention.  People  do  not 
break  up  old  associations  and  move  about  except  owing  to  their 
health  or  to  improve  their  social  surroundings,  or  financial 
affairs.  These  I  take  to  be  the  prime  reasons  why  people 
change  their  place  of  abode. 

As  relates  to  health  between  the  city  and  country  districts 
that  is  a  matter  that  I  think  need  not  be  taken  into  considera¬ 
tion,  for  the  difference  in  change  of  population  as  between  the 
cities  and  country  sections  would  be  very  small.  The  reason 
must  be  that  the  country  people  go  to  the  city  to  improve  their 
social  surroundings,  or  in  the  hopes  of  bettering  themselves  in 
financial  way. 

That  the  cities  have  many  advantages  over  the  country  dis¬ 
tricts  in  a  social  way  there  is  no  question.  But  that  is  a  feature 
of  the  question  that  others  better  qualified  that  I  will  take  up 
and  discuss  with  you. 

The  movement  from  the  country  to  the  city  is  in  no  small 
measure  for  financial  reasons,  I  am  quite  certain.  The  problem 
of  financial  returns  to  the  farmer  is  a  subject  that  can  be  di¬ 
vided  into  many  reasons,  such  as  the  fertility  of  the  soil, 
methods  of  farming,  efficiency  and  cost  of  farm  help,  method 
and  cost  of  marketing  the  crop,  ability  to  secure  sufficient 
money  on  long  time  and  at  a  low  rate  of  interest  to  make  his 
land  payments,  ability  to  finance  himself  during  the  crop  grow¬ 
ing  and  marketing  period,  and  other  questions  that  affect  farm 
profits. 

In  the  past  and  until  quite  recently  we  had  large  areas  of  the 
finest  of  lands  that  a  man  with  limited  means  could  acquire 
ownership  of  at  but  little  more  than  the  asking.  This  was  a 
great  incentive  for  a  man  of  small  capital  to  take  up  his  home 


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13 


in  the  country  where  he  coulcl  soon  become  an  independent 
home  owner.  The  day  of  the  free  lands  is  now  gone  and  lands 
that  could  be  purchased  at  a  nominal  figure  but  a  few  years 
ago  today  command  a  good  round  sum — a  fortune  to  a  pool 
man — and  are  now  out  of  the  reach  of  a  vast  number  of  our 
people  who  would  remain  in  the  country,  or  would  remove  to 
the  country  could  they  but  secure  money  on  terms  that  would 
v  arrant  them  in  engaging  in  farming  operations.  Not  being 
able  to  secure  a  foothold  in  the  country,  and  seeing  but  little 
opportunity  of  bettering  their  financial  conditions,  they  are 
attracted  toward  the  city  where,  seemnigly,  they  may  be  able 
to  command  a  better  price  for  what  they  have  to  sell — their 
labor — spending  no  small  portion  of  all  the  balance  of  their 
lives  in  day  labors,  dependent  upon  some  one  else  for  a  job. 
They  are  rearing  their  families  in  an  atmosphere  that  does  not 
give  to  the  child  that  broad  vision  of  life  that  is  given  to  the  ' 
child  who  is  raised  in  the  country. 

Could  they  have  secured  money  on  long  time  and  at  a  suffi¬ 
ciently  low  rate  of  interest  that  would  warrant  the  investment 
they  would  have  become  permanent  residents  in  the  country, 
and  in  time  would  have  become  independent  home  owners — 
the  backbone  of  our  Republic. 

Then  again  we  have  many  who  have  obtained  a  temporary 
foothold  in  the  country,  but  have  been  unable  to  make  good  for 
the  reason  that  they  have  not  been  able  to  secure  funds  to  carry 
them  through  the  crop-growing  periods,  except  at  an  enormous 
rate  of  interest,  which  has  taken  all  the  profit  and  discouraged 
them  in  their  efforts.  They  have  sold  out  and  gone  to  the  city. 

Have  we  financial  institutions  in  this  country  which  a  man 
with  small  capital  but  with  plenty  of  energy,  from  which  a 
man  can  borrow  money  on  long  time  and  at  a  sufficiently  low 
rate  of  interest  that  he  may  in  time  pay  out?  Not  at  the  prices 
farm  lands  now  command.  Therefore  he  is  compelled  to  re¬ 
main  a  hired  hand  on  the  farm,  or  else  seek  employment  else¬ 
where. 

Do  we  have  institutions  in  this  country  that  will  carry  a 
farmer  through  the  crop-growing  period  and  furnish  him 


14 


Rural  Life  Conference 


sufficient  money  at  a  low  rate  of  interest  until  lie  can  mar¬ 
ket  his  crop?  We  have  not. 

It  is  our  duty  then  to  study  this  situation  to  learn  if  pres¬ 
ent  methods  can  not  he  improved  upon,  or  institutions  cre¬ 
ated  that  will  assist  the  man  with  small  capital  who  wishes 
to  invest  in  the  country,  and  to  give  to  him  ready  money  so 
that  he  can  secure  land  of  his  own  and  furnish  him  money 
at  a  low  rate  of  interest  to  meet  his  harvesting  expenses  and 
not  be  compelled  to  dump  his  crop  on  the  market  as  soon  as 
harvested,  but  allow  him  to  market  his  crop  as  conditions 
warrant  a  sale,  the  money  to  be  returned  as  fast  as  his  crop 
is  disposed  of,  the  rate  of  interest  depending  upon  the 
amount  of  money  required  and  the  length  of  time  retained; 
the  greater  the  amount  and  the  longer  time  retained,  the 
higher  rate  of  interest.  Also  to  furnish  the  farmers  money 
to  erect  community  warehouses,  cold  storage  plants,  evapora¬ 
tors,  canneries,  elevators,  creameries,  etc. 

We  find  that  in  many  European  countries  they  have  farm¬ 
ers’  organizations  for  the  very  purpose  of  relieving  the  con¬ 
ditions  we  are  complaining  of;  to  assist  the  man  who  wishes 
to  purchase  land  by  loaning  him  money  up  to  To  per  cent  of 
the  value  on  long  time  and  at  a  low  rate  of  interest;  to 
furnish  the  farmer  ready  money  at  a  nominal  rate  of 
interest  to  harvest  and  to  carry  his  crop  until  disposed  of. 

During  his  term  of  office,  President  Taft  directed  the 
Department  of  State  to  make  an  investigation  of  the  agri¬ 
cultural  credit  systems  in  operation  in  certain  European 
countries.  In  his  preliminary  report  to  the  President,  Am¬ 
bassador  Myron  T.  Herrick  states : 

“The  investigation  conducted  thus  far  warrants  the  con¬ 
clusion  that  land  and  agricultural  credit  are  so  thoroughly 
organized  in  most  of  the  European  nations  that  real  estate 
securities  are  as  liquid  and  sound  as  municipal  bonds,  while 
the  honest,  capable  and  industrious  farmer  is  able  to  supply 
himself  with  working  funds  for  short  or  long  time  when  de¬ 
sired.  The  institutions  and  also  the  systems  devised  for  these 
objects  have  certain  basic  features  in  common,  but  vary  con¬ 
siderable  in  type,  and  thereby  show  a  remarkable  adaptabil- 


State  College  of  Washington 


15 


ity  to  all  sorts  of  social  and  economical  conditions  such  as 
exist  in  America.  The  rates  of  interest  at  which  they  are  able 
to  lend  money  fall  even  below  the  European  commercial  rate 
and  are  about  one-third  to  one-half  less  than  what  prevail  in 
the  United  States. 


“Farmers  in  many  parts  of  Europe  are  as  familiar  with  the 
credit  and  banking  business  as  the  tradespeople  in  towns  and 
cities,  and  the  great  bulk  of  their  loans  have  been  made  on 
personal  or  chattel  security.  The  loans  secured  by  land  mort¬ 
gages,  as  a  rule,  are  not  repayable  in  lump  at  the  end  of  a 
few  years,  but  run  on  for  30  or  50  years,  and  are  gradually 
wiped  out  by  small  semi-annual  payments  coming  out  of  the 
income  of  the  property.  Foreclosures  are  infrequent,  and  no 
company,  dealing  principally  in  these  so-called  long-time 
*  amortizable”  farm  loans,  has  failed  or  occasioned  loss  to  in¬ 
vestors  in  recent  times.  Farm  paper  and  mortgage  bonds  are 
considered  investments  of  the  safest  sort — the  latter  being 
listed  on  the  bourse  or  stock  exchange  and  having  an  inter¬ 
national  market. 


“This  almost  complete  organization  of  land  and  rural  credit 
in  advanced  European  nations  was  not  a  haphazard  and  spon¬ 
taneous  growth.  It  was  brought  about  by  the  insistence  of 
public  and  private  individuals,  philanthropists,  scholars,  bank¬ 
ers,  legislators,  agricultural  societies,  government  commissions, 
and  national  assemblies,  all  studying  and  working  in  a  com¬ 
mon  cause.  The  history  of  their  efforts  in  the  middle  of  the. 
past  century  reads  much  like  an  account  of  the  agitation 
which  has  been  started  in  the  United  States  by  the  American 
Bankers’  Association,  the  Southern  Commercial  Congress,  the 
Federal  authorities  at  Washington,  and  other  bodies  and  in¬ 
dividuals  for  financing  the  farmer,  improving  agricultural 
conditions,  and  encouraging  the  movement  back  to  the  soil.  In 
Europe  the  agricultural  banks  and  credit  facilities  were  cre¬ 
ated  before  agricultural  or  even  general  education  was  at¬ 
tempted.  The  United  States  began  at  the  opposite  end.  The 
American  colleges  and  systems  for  teaching  agriculture  are 
among  the  oldest  and  best  in  the  world,  and  millions  of  dol¬ 
lars  have  been  appropriated  by  the  Federal  and  State  legis- 


16 


Rural  Life  Conference 


latures  since  the  passage  of  the  Morrill  Act  in  Lincoln’s  ad¬ 
ministration  to  aid  this  science  in  one  way  or  another.  Incal¬ 
culable  good  has  come  therefrom,  but  the  results  would  have 
been  far  greater  if  financial  education  had  gone  hand  m  hand 
with  this  work.  It  would  have  led  to  the  study  and  intro¬ 
duction  of  the  rural  banking  methods  of  Europe  generations 
ago,  and  so  familiarized  the  American  farmers  with  the  uses 
of  credit  that  the  lack  of  capital  and  excessive  interest  rates 
would  not  now  be  interfering  with  the  agriculural  develop¬ 
ment  of  the  country. 

“  Personal  credit  in  agricultural  Europe  is  obtained  usually 
by  means  of  the  cooperative  credit  associations.  They  are 
also  used  by  artisans  and  small  tradespeople  in  the  towns  and 
cities.  These  associations  are  in  fact  the  only  banks  which 
the  farmers  will  patronize  for  short-time  loans  in  the  nations 
where  they  abound  in  the  greatest  numbers.  With  their  aid 
poverty  and  usury  have  been  banished,  sterile  fields  have  been 
made  fertile,  production  has  been  increased,  and  agriculture 
and  agricultural  science  raised  to  the  highest  point.  Their 
educational  influence  is  no  less  marked.  They  have  taught 
the  farmers  the  uses  of  credit  as  well  as  of  cash,  given  them 
a  commercial  instinct  and  business  knowledge,  and  stimulated 
them  to  associated  action.  They  have  encouraged  thrift  and 
saving,  created  a  feeling  of  independence  and  self-reliance,  and 
even  elevated  their  moral  tone.  v 

“The  picture  can  hardly  be  overdrawn.  Every  traveler  who 
visits  the  places  where  these  little  associations  exist  speaks 
in  glowing  phases  of  the  prosperity  and  contentment  that  pre¬ 
vail.  They  are  organized  on  such  simple  lines  that  their  man¬ 
agement  requires  only  ordinary  intelligence.  Failures  have 
rarely  occurred.  In  France  and  other  countries  they  hold  a 
record  of  never  having  lost  a  cent.  The  working  capital  and 
number  of  members  of  individual  associations  are  so  small  as 
to  be  insignificant,  yet  they  do  one-third  of  the  banking  busi¬ 
ness  of  Italy;  while  the  combined  amount  of  their  operations 
in  Germany  equal  that  of  the  commercial  banks.  But  tha 
mutual  banks,  both  in  town  and  country,  are  looked  upon  with 
favor  in  the  financial  world  because  they  keep  millions  of  dol- 


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17 


lars  of  petty  sums  in  circulation  which,  except  for  them,  would 
be  idle  and  hoarded.  They  are,  in  fact,  feeders  for  the  com¬ 
mercial  banking  system. 

“In  1909  in  Belgium  458  banks,  with  a  membership  of  25,762,. 
had  outstanding  (rouglity  calculated)  $4,000,000  of  loans;  in 
France  96  regional  banks  did  upward  of  $25,000,000  of  busi¬ 
ness  on  a  capital  of  $2,983,646 ;  while  the  2,983  local  banks,, 
with  a  membership  of  133,382  farmers,  had  $2,622,241  of  capi¬ 
tal  and  a  record  of  over  $20,500,000  of  operations.  There  were 
nearly  6,000  banks  in  Austria.  The  membership  was  over 
725,666,  and  the  loans  ran  over  $86,500,000.  In  Italy  690 
banks  that  furnished  reports  had  a.  working  capital  of  over 
$170,091,946.  In  Germany  there  is  one  bank  for  every  1,600. 
of  the  population,  and  the  total  business  done  was  over  $4,- 
888,000,000.  In  one  Province  there  is  a  bank  for  every  3,000 
acres  of  land,  and  so  on  for  all  other  nations  that  have  co¬ 
operative  credit  institutions. 

“With  this  striking  array  of  figures  to  show  its  stability  and 
usefulness,  it  is  remarkable  that  the  farmers  of  the  United 
States  have  been  so  slow  to  adopt  this  system  of  banking  for 
temporary  loans  on  personal  security.  It  has  existed  in  Can¬ 
ada  for  22  years.  In  the  Province  of  Quebec  there  are  a  num¬ 
ber  of  mutual  banks  that  have  loaned  hundreds  of  thousands, 
of  dollars.  Massachusetts  is  the  only  state  in  our  country 
that  has  made  an  attempt  to  encourage  its  introduction.  It 
already  has  a  law  allowing  the  incorporation  of  credit  unions. 
It  was  passed  in  1909  after  a  careful  study  of  European  legis¬ 
lation,  and  furnishes  an  excellent  example  for  the  other  states. 
The  first  concern  to  start  under  this  law  was  the  Myrick 
Credit  Union  at  Springfield.  In  12  months  it  had  105  mem¬ 
bers,  a  capital  of  $3,000,  and  $10,000  of  outstanding  loans. 
Interest  rates  have  been  low,  yet  it  paid  over  6  per  cent  divi¬ 
dends  on  its  capital.  Thirteen  new  unions  were  formed  in 
1911  and  have  $25,000  of  capital.  A  pamphlet  issued  by  the 
State  Bank  Commissioner  gives  a  comprehensive  description 
of  the  fundamental  principles  that  a  mutual  association  for 
personal  credit  must  adhere  to.” 

In  Germany,  the  home  of  the  cooperative  land  and  agricul- 


18 


Rural  Life  Conference 


tural  credit,  they  have  several  systems:  The  Landsehaften, 
the  Raiffeisen,  the  Sehulze-Delitzch,  are  the  more  prominent. 
The  object  of  the  associations  is  to  give  credit  to  their  mem¬ 
bers  on  favorable  terms  and  not  to  make  a  commercial  profit. 

The  main  principles  underlying  all  forms  of  cooperative 
credit  are  that  if  a  group  of  persons  combine  to  furnish  a 
collective  guaranty  they  can,  on  the  security  of  that  guaranty, 
obtain  money  at  lower  rates  of  interest  than  they  could  indi¬ 
vidually.  The  collective  guaranty  may  be  that  of  real  prop¬ 
erty.  A  number  of  land  owners  may  obtain  capital  on  the 
security  of  a  collective  mortgage  on  their  lands.  This  is  the 
basis  of  the  German  Landsehaften — the  oldest  form  of  co¬ 
operative  credit  institutions.  Or  the  collective  guaranty  may 
be  a  personal  one.  A  number  may  obtain  capital  by  making 
themselves  jointly  responsible.  The  liability  may  be  unlimited 
as  under  the  Raiffeisen  system,  or  a  limited  liability  as  under 
the  Sehulze-Delitzsch  system. 


Upon  such  guaranties  capital  may  be  obtained  in  a  variety 
of  ways.  In  Germany  the  Landsehaften  issue  bonds,  but  the 
Raiffeisen  banks  derive  their  working  capital  mainly  from  the 
deposits  they  are  able  to  attract.  In  France  the  rural  banks 
depend  mainly  upon  capital  advanced  by  the  state.  In  all 
countries  the  credit  societies  are  able  to  obtain  capital  from 
the  larger  banking  institutions  or  from  the  investing  public. 

Having  obtained  the  capital,  the  group  of  persons  must  be 
able  to  lend  it  to  one  another  at  a  rate  of  interest  only  slightly 
in  excess  of  the  rate  which  they  pay  collectively.  This  requires 
two  conditions:  (1)  that  the  expenses  of  the  management  shall 
be  small  in  proportion  to  the  business  done,  and  (2)  that  the 
risk  of  loss  shall  be  reduced  to  a  minimum. 

Where  the  business  is  very  large,  the  expenses  are  not  pro¬ 
portionately  high,  even  if  the  undertaking  be  conducted  on 
ordinary  commercial  lines,  as  we  shall  see  in  the  case  of  the 
Sehulze-Delitzch  banks.  Where,  however,  the  business  is 
small  there  must  be  no  attempt  to  pay  high  dividends  and  the 
management  must  be  largely  voluntary.  In  the  banks  formed 
on  the  Raiffeisen  system  (which  are  individually  small,  though 
in  the  aggregate  they  do  an  enormous  business)  the  payment 


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19 


of  dividends  is  either  prohibited  altogether,  or  it  is  limited  to 
a  small  percentage,  while  the  management  is  almost  entirely 
gratuitous. 

To  reduee  the  risk  of  loans  to  members,  many  safeguards 
have  been  devised  which  are  adopted  to  varying  extents  in  the 
different  systems. 

Where  the  members  are  land  owners  and  can  give  mort¬ 
gages  of  their  property,  it  is  only  necessary  to  insure  that  the 
amount  of  the  loan  shall  be  fully  secured  by  the  mortgage, 
allowing  for  any  possible  depreciation  in  the  value  of  the 
property.  Loans  on  mortgage  are,  however,  an  inconvenient 
form  of  credit,  where  capital  is  only  required  for  a  compara¬ 
tively  short  period,  and  the  following  are  the  principal  safe¬ 
guards  for  loans  given  on  personal  security : 

1.  That  loans  are  only  made  to  members  of  the  group  and 
that  only  persons  known  to  be  trustworthy  are  admitted. 

2.  That  membership  is  confined  to  persons  residing  with¬ 
in  a  small  district  and  that,  therefore,  the  members  are  per¬ 
sonally  known  to  one  another. 

3.  That  the  members  being  mutually  responsible,  it  will 
be  to  the  interest  of  all  members  to  keep  an  eye  upon  a  bor¬ 
rower  and  to  see  that  he  makes  proper  use  of  the  money  lent 
to  him. 

4.  That,  in  like  manner,  it  is  to  the  interest  of  all  mem¬ 
bers  to  help  a  member  when  he  is  in  difficulties. 

5.  That  the  borrower  is  required  to  find  sureties  or  give 
other  collateral  security  for  the  repayment  of  the  loan. 

6.  That  the  borrower  binds  himself  to  apply  his  loan  to  a 
specific  purpose  which  will  bring  in  a  monetary  return  suffic¬ 
ient  to  enable  him  to  repay  the  sum  borrowed,  to  pay  the  in¬ 
terest  charged,  and  to  leave  a  net  profit  for  himself. 

In  France  they  have  a  state  endowed  institution  known  as 
the  Credit  Agricole  Mutuel,  which  was  founded  some  14  years 
ago.  The  ground  work  of  the  system  consists  of  a  number  of 
in  dividual  societies  organized  on  the  principle  of  Raiffeisenism. 
The  funds  for  financing  the  scheme  are  largely  supplied  by  the 
state,  which,  as  a  condition  of  the  renewal  of  the  charter  by 
the  Bank  of  France  in  1897,  should  loan,  without  interest,  the 


20 


Rural  Life  Conference 


bum  of  forty  millions  of  francs  for  the  purpose  of  agrieulturer 
and  should  in  addition  furnish  a  further  annual  sum  by  way 
of  tax  for  the  same  purpose. 

The  French  system  is  somewhat  complex,  and  I  doubt  if  it 
could  be  worked  out  in  this  country  unless  considerably  modi¬ 
fied. 

The  problem  of  financing  our  agricultural  classes  is  one  that 
requires  careful  consideration,  and  no  steps  should  be  taken 
until  we  are  sure  of  our  ground. 

In  my  message  to  the  last  legislature  I  recommended  that 
an  appropriation  be  made  and  a  commission  appointed  for  the 
purpose  of  making  a  thorough  investigation  of  cooperative 
rural  banking  to  the  end  that  some  system  might  be  devised 
or  adopted  that  would  be  of  benefit  to  our  farming  popula¬ 
tion.  I  understand  that  no  action  was  taken.  Agitation  should 
be  kept  up  on  this  question  and  action  demanded  of  the  next 
legislature. 


COOPERATIVE  MARKETING. 

H.  C.  Sampson. 

Before  1912  Northwestern  box  apples  were  a  novelty  and 
as  such  sold  themselves.  With  1912  the  Northwestern  apple 
ceased  to  be  a  novelty,  because  a  commodity,  and  therefore 
ceased  to  sell  itself,  and  now,  like  any  other  product  or  arti¬ 
cle  of  manufacture,  requires  a  scientific,  constructive  selling 
machine. 

In  1912  there  was:  (1)  an  over-production  of  fruit,  or  (2) 
an  under-distribution  and  failure  of  the  then  marketing  ma¬ 
chines  to  handle  that  fruit.  And  with  only  ten  per  cent  of 
our  present  apple  acreage  of  the  states  of  Oregon,  Washing¬ 
ton,  Idaho,  and  Montana  in  bearing,  in  1912,  if  there  was  an 
over-production,  what  will  happen  when  one  hundred  per  cent 
of  that  acreage  comes  into  bearing? 

These  four  states  at  present  have  505,000  acres  of  apples  al¬ 
ready  planted,  to  say  nothing  of  approximately  75,000  acres 
of  other  fruits.  If,  because  of  poor  selection  of  orchard  sites, 
soil  and  varieties,  poor  judgment  of  growers,  and  effects  of 


State  College  of  Washington 


21 


pests  and  diseases,  we  eliminate  255,000  acres  of  apples  as 
being  non-commercial,  we  still  have  250,000  acres  confronting 
ns  some  few  years  in  the  future. 

I  am  told  that  a  twelve-year-old  orchard  should  produce  a 
carload  per  acre.  To  be  perfectly  conservative  assume  the 
production  will  be  one-half  carload  per  acre  for  twelve-year- 
cld  trees.  We  then  have  confronting  us  in  the  near  future 
125,000  carloads  of  apples  instead  of  8,000  as  in  1913,  and 
15,000  as  in  1912.  If  then,  there  were  an  over-production  in 
1912  and  the  then  marketing  machinery  was  as  effective  as 
any  we  can  develop,  we  should  dig  up  our  apple  trees  imme¬ 
diately. 

However,  after  traveling  more  than  17,000  miles  and  giving 
more  than  eighteen  months  of  study  to  this  proposition ;  talk¬ 
ing  with  growers,  railway  officials,  bankers,  business  men, 
heads  of  organizations,  United  States  Department  of  Agricul¬ 
ture,  wholesalers,  commission  men,  retailers,  and  in  fact  with 
all  I  could  come  in  contact  with  whose  judgment  I  thought 
might  bear  on  the  case,  I  feel  assured  that  there  was  no  over¬ 
production  in  1912,  and  that  with  proper  selection  of  place  and 
variety,  with  proper  pruning,  cultivation,  thinning,  spraying, 
etc.,  and  with  the  right  sort  of  marketing  and  distributing  ma¬ 
chinery  and  that  machinery  in  control  of  a  sufficient  per  cent 
of  our  tonnage,  I  feel  perfectly  assured,  I  say,  that  there  is 
ahead  of  the  Northwest  apple  grower  a  reasonable  price  for 
his  labor,  and  a  reasonable  interest  return  on  his  investment. 

The  expert  orchardist  is  the  one  to  outline  and  direct,  with 
regard  to  choice  of  site,  the  orchard  cultivation,  in  short  the 
scientific  side  of  production.  But  just  as  scientific  manufac¬ 
turing  can  not  succeed  without  scientific  advertising,  distri¬ 
bution  and  selling  organizations,  so  scientific  production  alone 
results  in  failure  without  scientific  advertising,  distributing 
and  selling  machinery. 

If,  then,  I  am  correct  thus  far  in  my  analysis  of  the  neces¬ 
sity  of  a  better  and  larger  selling  institution,  and  with  a  larger 
tonnage  than  in  1912,  the  question  naturally  arises  to  me,  an 
apple  grower,  can  I  wisely  and  successfully  handle  my  own 
product  this  coming  season  and  for  succeeding  seasons  and 


22 


Rural  Life  Conference 


particularly  when  that  125,000  carloads  of  apples  stares  me 
in  the  face  a  few  years  hence? 

Every  trade  or  sale  is  a  contest  between  the  minds,  person¬ 
ality,  knowledge  of  conditions,  as  well  as  the  experience,  of  the 
two  men  making  the  trade.  If  it  be  the  sale  of  apples  each 
man  brings  to  the  selling  or  buying  his  knowledge  of  market 
and  crop  conditions  and  his  experience  in  the  selling  or  buy¬ 
ing  of  fruit,  together  with  his  personality  and  business  capac¬ 
ity.  For  example:  Some  months  ago  the  biggest  buyer 
-of  boxed  fruit  in  the  United  States  sat  in  our  office 
in  conference  with  our  sales  manager  and  general 
manager.  He  wanted  approximately  a  quarter  of  a  million 
dollars  worth  of  apples,  and  incidentally  ten  carloads  of  prunes. 
He  knew  thoroughly  and  well  the  market  and  crop  conditions, 
because  as  a  buyer  of  probably  four  to  five  million  dollars’ 
worth  of  apples  each  year  he  can  well  afford  to  pay  a  snug 
sum  of  money  per  year  for  a  wonderfully  accurate  and  help- 
fid  knowledge  of  crop  and  market  situations.  He  likewise 
brought  to  this  barter  or  meeting  with  our  officers  an  experi¬ 
ence  of  twenty-five  to  thirty  years  in  the  fruit  game.  Now  I, 
as  an  individual  apple  grower,  can  not  spend  what  the  North 
Pacific  Fruit  Distributors  can  and  has  spent  this  present  sea¬ 
son  for  market  and  crop  reports,  viz :  the  stupdenous  sum  of 
$20,000,  in  order  to  have  a  knowledge  of  crop  and  market  con¬ 
ditions  equal  to  that  of  the  buyer  himself.  But  six  thousand 
growers  associated  together  in  the  North  Pacific  Fruit  Dis¬ 
tributors  can  and  have  spent  such  a  sum  of  money  that  their 
officers,  who  are  the  growers’  representatives,  may  be  as  fully 
informed  on  these  things  as  is  the  buyer  himself,  and  therefore 
can  meet  the  buyer  on  his  own  ground. 

When  this  buyer  talked  prunes  he  stated  the  price  in  New 
York  wras  low  and  would  probably  go  lower.  A  telegram  that 
very  day  from  New  York  city,  shown  to  the  would-be  buyer, 
and  stating  that  the  price  of  prunes  was  firm  and  would  go 
higher,  took  away  from  the  buyer  the  strength  of  his  argu¬ 
ment.  He  could  but  smile  on  this  point  and  come  back  to  the 
contest  with  a  statement  that  our  own  production  in  these 
four  Northwestern  states  was  unusually  large  and  therefore 


State  College  of  Washington 


23 


we  must  expect  a  lower  priee  than  we  wrere  demanding.  Ref¬ 
erence  to  our  minute  book,  containing  the  confidential  crop 
report  from  our  trustees  (made  possible  through  the  coopera¬ 
tion  of  the  prune  growers  of  the  Northwest),  showTed  the  buyer 
that  again  he  was  in  error,  as  our  crop  outlook  was  below  and 
not  above  normal  as  he  claimed.  Then  he  stated  that  other 
prune  growing  sections  than  ours  had  unusually  large  crops 
ann  therefore,  in  competition  with  this  over-production  else¬ 
where,  our  prices  must  be  lowered.  But  when  our  sales  man¬ 
ager  quietly  produced  telegrams  from  these  other  various, 
prune  growing  sections  and  proved  the  buyer  wrong  for  the 
third  time,  the  buyer  smiled  for  the  third  time  and  immedi¬ 
ately  agreed  to  pay  us  a  total  of  $1,100  more  for  those  ten  car¬ 
le. ads  of  prunes  than  he  had  within  ten  minutes  before  stated 
positively  he  would  pay. 

Again  I  repeat,  then,  that  as  an  individual  grower  I  can  not 
meet  this  buyer  or  any  other  buyer  with  that  knowledge  of 
market  and  crop  conditions  and  buying  or  selling  experience, 
and  therefore  can  not  hold  my  own  with  him. 

And  what  is  true  of  me,  an  individual  grower,  to  almost  the 
same  degree  is  true  with  a  small  local  association  or  independ¬ 
ent  concern  handling  but  a  small  tonnage,  and  would  be  equal¬ 
ly  true  of  a  large  association  in  any  one  district.  The  local 
association  could  do  little  better  than  I,  and  the  whole  Yakima 
or  whole  Hood  River  or  whole  Wenatchee  District,  if  abso¬ 
lutely  together  in  one  association,  could  still  do  a  great  deal 
more  than  could  the  individual  grower  or  the  small  associa¬ 
tion  or  concern,  but  it  could  not  do  what  six  to  ten  thousand 
growers  from  all  districts  can  and  are  doing  through  the  North 
Pacific  Fruit  Distributors,  and  will  continue  to  do  in  succeed¬ 
ing  years  to  a  much  larger  degree. 

As  an  individual  grower  I  can  not  create  and  maintain  and 
secure  a  demand  for  a  uniform  grade  and  pack  and  brand  that 
will  cause  people  to  know  and  demand  my  fruit  throughout  the 
entire  country  and  bring  me  an  increase  of  price  because  of 
that  name  and  brand.  My  tonnage  alone  is  not  sufficient  to 
do  this,  and  again,  what  is  true  of  me  is  true  of  the  small  local 


24 


Rural  Life  Conference 


concern  or  organization  and  to  a  partial  degree  is  true  of  even 
our  bigger  valley  or  district  associations  of  the  present  day. 

For  many  years  I  bought  oranges  without  knowing  one  type 
or  kind  or  brand  and  often  the  oranges  I  bought  were  very 
unsatisfactory.  But  in  the  past  few  years  I  have  learned  a 
grade  and  brand  of  oranges  packed  by  a  reputable  growers' 
organization  of  California.  And  knowing  that  these  oranges 
are  always  uniform  and  always  of  high  grade,  I  demand  and 
take  no  other  brand,  even  though  the  price  be  ten  or  fifteen 
cents  more  per  dozen  than  for  some  other  orange  which  my 
dealer  may  assure  me  is  “just  as  good  or  better”.  This  same 
thing  is  absolutely  true  of  our  apples,  and  can  be  brought 
about  only  through  the  affiliation  of  many  thousands  of  grow¬ 
ers,  as  is  the  case  today  with  the  North  Pacific  Fruit  Distribu¬ 
tors. 

Recently  a  grower  in  Yakima  Valley  asked  permission  to 
turn  the  “ Y ”  (which  indicated  his  brand)  inside  of  his  peach 
boxes  and  put  his  own  name  and  brand  on  the  outside.  This 
permission  was  given,  but  the  inspection  made  on  this  carload 
of  peaches  was  the  same  made  and  required  on  all  the  ‘ 4  Big  Y 
Brand”  output.  This  particular  carload  of  peaches  was  sold  - 
by  us  in  Portland,  the  buyer  having  ordered  “Y”  Brand 
peaches. 

But  the  buyer  wTas  very  angry  when  he  received  these 
peaches  and  called  us  by  long  distance  to  know  why  he  had 
not  received  what  he  ordered.  We  assured  him  he  had  re- 
received  4 ‘ Y ”  Brand  peaches,  “Y”  Brand  grade,  and  “Y” 
Brand  inspection,  and  that  the  “ Y”  Brand  was  on  the  inside 
of  the  boxes.  He  said  that  made  no  difference  at  all  as  his 
retail  customers  had  built  up  a  trade  for  “Y”  Brand  peaches, 
their  consumers  demanded  “Y”  Brand  peaches  and  nothing 
but  “Y”  Brand  peaches  would  satisfy  them.  It  was  then 
necessary  for  us  to  make  an  allowance  of  5c  per  crate  on  this 
entire  carload  of  peaches  (a  total  of  $55)  because  this  grower 
would  not  make  use  of  the  established  brand  and  reap  the 
benefit  thereby.  I,  as  a  grower,  need  the  assistance  of  six  to 
ten  thousand  other  growers  to  help  me  create  and  maintain 
such  grades  and  brands  in  order  that  there  will  be  a  demand 


State  College  of  Washington 


25 


at  better  prices  for  my  product.  This  I  can  not  do  if  I  turn 
one  consignment  to  this  man  today  and  that  man  tomorrow, 
this  section  of  the  country  today  and  that  one  tomorrow,  or 
sell  to  this  dealer  today  and  another  tomorrow.  Then,  too,  I 
haven’t  a  sufficient  output  to  maintain  a  grade  and  brand. 
And  what  is  true  of  me  is  true  of  my  neighbors,  and  true  of 
small  associations.  Six  to  ten  thousand  growers  banded  to¬ 
gether  can  make  a  uniform  grade,  pack  and  brand,  and  there¬ 
fore  reap  the  benefit. 

As  an  individual  grower  I  can  not  distribute  my  fruit  wisely, 
for-  a  wise  distribution  requires  that  no  market  have  too  much 
fruit  at  any  one  time  and  no  market  too  little.  If  I  knew 
where  every  other  grower  and  organization  was  going  to  ship 
I  perhaps  could  distribute  my  staff  wisely,  but  that  knowledge 
I  never  have. 

If  all  other  growers  work  separately  we  will  flood  some  mar- 
•  kets  and  starve  others  and  thereby  get  the  most  disastrous  re¬ 
sults.  This  was  undoubtedly  the  cause  in  1912  when  our  dis¬ 
tribution  was  very  imperfect.  Two  or  three  hundred  little 
associations  or  independent  dealers  will  be  much  better  in 
this  respect  perhaps  than  five  or  six  thousand  growers  work¬ 
ing  separately  and  independently  of  each  other,  but  two  or 
three  hundred  little  selling  organizations  will  undoubtedly  cut 
each  others’  throats  as  in  1912,  and  no  one,  particularly  the 
producer,  would  gain  thereby. 

Recently  the  North  Pacific  Fruit  Distributors,  through  mar¬ 
ket  reports,  found  that  the  distribution  was  too  heavy  towards 
Chicago  and  middle  west,  New  York  and  export  points.  Im¬ 
mediately  we  sent  an  expert  through  Oklahoma  and  Texas 
points  and  found  there  was  a  keen  demand,  at  prices  from 
fifteen  to  twenty  cents  per  box  better  than  we  could  possibly 
receive  in  Chicago  and  New  York  points.  But  it  is  too  ex¬ 
pensive  for  me,  an  individual  grower,  to  send  a  man  to  spy 
out  more  desirable  markets  and  thus  relieve  the  congestion 
of  Chicago  and  New  York  and  create  a  better  demand  for 
our  present  storage  stock  in  those  points  and  find  an  immedi¬ 
ate  output  with  very  satisfactory  prices  in  Texas  and  Okla¬ 
homa  or  other  points.  But  thanks  to  the  tonnage  and  means 


26 


Rural  Life  Conference 


available  through  the  cooperation  of  six  thousand  growers 
our  organization  can  and  did  do  this  thing.  Small  local  or  in¬ 
dependent  associations  could  not  do  this,  and  the  expense 
would  be  somewhat  heavy  on  the  part  of  large  districts  or 
groups  of  associations  with  a  membership  of  only  300  to  500. 
But  a  membership  of  six  thousand  can  easily  bear  this  burden 
which  becomes  very  light  when  divided  among  so  many 
shoulders. 

As  an  individual  grower  I  can  not  leave  my  orchard  and 
accompany  my  carload  of  fruit  east,  nor  can  I  employ  and 
station  men,  on  a  salary  basis,  at  all  the  leading  division  points 
on  the  railways,  such  as  San  Francisco,  Dallas  (Texas),  Omaha, 
Denver.  Butte,  Winnipeg,  Minneapolis,  Chicago,  New  York, 
and  London  as  is  the  ease  with  the  North  Pacific  Fruit  Dis¬ 
tributors.  Nor  can  I  afford  or  secure  seventy  to  one  hundred 
exclusive  agents  in  as  many  additional  distributive  points 
throughout  the  United  States  and  Canada,  to  send  me  daily 
market  and  crop  reports,  to  inspect  carloads  of  fruit  passing 
through  their  cities,  to  inspect  for  me  fruit  rejected  by  buyers, 
to  solicit  orders  for  carloads  of  fruit  from  their  customers  and 
friends;  all  of  which  I  can  not  possibly  do  at  this  long  range. 
Six  to  ten  thousand  growers  affiliated  together  in  an  organi¬ 
zation  can  employ  such  salaried  representatives  and  such  other 
exclusive  agents  as  the  North  Pacific  Fruit  Distributors  do,  so 
that  each  individual  grower  has  more  than  one  hundred  capa¬ 
ble  men  wisely  “staked  out.”  as  it  were,  in  all  the  principal 
distributive  and  diversion  points  of  the  civilized  world,  and 
all  on  the  lookout  each  day  for  each  individual  growers'  in¬ 
terests.  And  the  experience  of  the  distributors  this  season  is 
lliat  the  nearness  of  a  representative  to  a  carload  of  fruit  at 
its  destination  often  causes  the  buyer  to  accept  that  carload 
at  the  full  f*.  o.  b.  price,  whereas  the  absence  of  the  owner,  or 
his  representative  (and  especially  a  solitary  fruit  grower  three 
thousand  miles  away),  will  permit  the  buyer  to  beat  down  the 
price  on  the  assumption  that  the  fruit  is  not  up  to  grade  and 
quality.  In  this  way  many  thousands  of  dollars  can  be  saved 
to  the  individual  grower  by  the  big  organization  through  its 
personal  representatives.  But  these  personal  representatives. 


State  College  of  Washington 


27 


can  not  possibly  be  maintained  by  the  individual  grower  or  the 
small  organization  and  only  to  a  partial  degree  by  a;  large  dis¬ 
trict  organization.  But  a  big  central  organization  <ean  and 
does  get  effective  results  in  this  particular. 

I,  as  an  individual  grower,  can  not  set  my  price  wisely  be¬ 
cause  I  lack  knowledge  of  market  and  crop,  conditions.  Nor 
can  I,  wdth  my  small  tonnage,  maintain  and  advance  that  price 
and  force  an  f.  o.  b.  basis,  as  every  other  trade  or<  profession 
than  that  of  the  farmer  does  determine  and  maintain,  the  price 
of  its  product  or  its  labor  through  intelligent,  cooperation 
(called  organization  or  combination  in  the  case  of  capital  and 
union  in  the  case  of  labor).  But  a  majority  of  the  growers 
banded  together,  with  a  knowledge  of  the  market  and  crop 
conditions,  can  set  a  fair  price  for  their  product  and  compel 
that  fair  price  to  be  paid.  The  North  Pacific  Fruit  Distribu¬ 
tors  in  July  served  wide  notice  on  the  buyers  that  the  growers 
affiliated  with  it  would  have  a  greater  knowledge  of  market 
and  crop  conditions  and,  in  justice  to  themselves,  would  de¬ 
mand  a  fair  division  of  the  profits.  And  these  growers, 
through  the  North  Pacific  Fruit  Distributors,  for  the  first 
time  in  the  history  of  the  Northwest  or  the  apple  industry 
anywhere,  did  determine  the  price  at  which  their  product 
should  be  sold.  i 

They  stated  that  the  opening  price  would  be  moderately  low 
for  a  certain  percentage  of  their  tonnage;  that  in, about  a  week 
or  ten  days  the  price  would  be  advanced  from  five,  to  ten  cents 
per  box,  and  that  this  same  step  would  be  taken  each  week  or 
ten  days  as  long  as  the  conditions,  season  and  mark  ex  .justi¬ 
fied.  This  the  distributors  absolutely  carried  out  to  the  letter 
For  example,  the  opening  price  on  extra  fancy  Jonathans  163 
and  larger  was  made  $1.35  (smaller  extra  fancy  Jonathans, 
other  grades  of  Jonathans  and  other  varieties  and  grades  of 
apples  in  due  ratio),  the  price  then  was  advanced  from  $1.35 
to  $1.40  (all  other  grades  and  varieties  in  proportion),  then  to 
$i.50,  $1.60,  $1.65,  $1.75,  and  finally  to  $1.85.  Likewise  extra 
fancy  winesaps  163  and  larger  were  started  at  $1.50  and  today 
are  $2.10. 

This  program  was  absolutely  carried  out  to  the  letter  and 


28 


Rural  Life  Conference 


thereby  tlie; market  was  made  stable,  both  for  men  in  our  own 
organization  and  buyers  and  dealers  outside  of  our  organiza¬ 
tion.  Big  eastern  buyers  having  confidence  that  we  could  in 
this  manner  force  a  rising  market  were  willing  and  glad  to 
buy  in  largo  quantities  of  us,  we  selling  a  proper  percentage 
of  our  fruit  at  each  step  as  the  price  advanced.  Never  before 
in  the  history  of  the  Northwest  has  the  apple  market  been  on 
a  continuous  rise  as  in  this  season. 

The  short  season  is  not  alone  responsible  for  this  condition, 
because  many  other  short  seasons  have  prevailed  in  the  past 
fifteen  years,  yet  always  heretofore  has  the  price  stopped  ris¬ 
ing  and  often  declined  during  the  harvesting  season.  This  was 
not  true1  in  1913  for  the  reason  that  the  distributors’  early 
sales  helped  to  diminish  the  number  of  carloads  usually  sent 
tramping  unsold  during  the  harvest  season.  And  more  than 
that,  the  purchase  of  large  quantities  of  fruit  by  big  eastern 
buyers  before  the  peak  of  the  harvest  set  a  pace  for  the  hun¬ 
dreds  and  thousands  of  little  buyers,  and  they  followed  the  lead 
of  the  big  “bell  wether”  buyers,  and  themselves  became  buy¬ 
ers  and  therefore  boosters  for  the  box-apple  product.  I,  an 
individual  grower,  could  not  possibly  have  accomplished  this 
result.  It  is  equally  impossible  for  a  small  local  association  or 
independent  dealer  or  even  a  sub-central  or  district  associa¬ 
tion  with  a  thousand  members  to  do  this  thing.  Only  through 
the  cooperation  of  six  to  ten  thousand  growers  controlling  at 
least  fifty  per  cent  of  the  Northwestern  product  is  such  a  con¬ 
trol  of  price  and  price  making  possible,  as  was  done  by  the 
distributors  (i.  e.  6,000  growers  in  organization)  in  1913 — the 
first  time  in  the  history  of  the  American  Northwest. 

I,  as  an  individual  grower,  could  not  furnish  a  buyer  with 
all  the  fruit  he  wants  in  any  grade,  variety,  and  from  any  sec¬ 
tion.  A  big  buyer  in  New  York  can  go  to  our  New  York  or 
Chicago  office,  or  come  to  the  main  office  at  Spokane,  or  by 
letter  or  wire,  can  arrange  through  a  big  central  organization 
like  ours,  for  McIntosh  from  Montana,  Wageners  from  Spo¬ 
kane,  Yellow  Newtowns  from  Hood  River,  Winesaps  from 
Yakima  or  Wenatchee,  and  any  other  grade  or  variety  or  kind 
he  chooses  from  any  one  or  all  of  the  various  apple  producing 


State  College  of  Washington 


29 


sections.  The  big  buyer  thus  can  save  time  and  money  by 
dealing  with  a  responsible  organization  that  will  guarantee 
the  fulfillment  of  its  contracts  as  to  quality  and  variety,  guar¬ 
antee  its  grade  and  pack,  and  with  it  carry  a  dependency  and 
observance  of  the  ethics  of  the  trade  that  is  not  possible  on 
the  part  of  any  one  individual  grower,  local  association,  inde¬ 
pendent  buyer  or  all-district  organization,  even  if  it  controlled 
every  individual  grower  of  the  entire  section,  as  of  the  Yakinva 
or  the  Wenatchee  or  the  Rogue  River  or  the  Walla  Walla  or 
South  Idaho.  Not  only  then  must  we  have  thousands  of  grow¬ 
ers  in  a  big  organization,  but  those  growers  should  cover  all 
the  fruit  producing  sections  of  the  whole  Northwest. 

Nowadays  intelligent  advertising  is  essential  to  the  sale  of 
any  product.  No  individual  grower  can  advertise  his  product 
successfully  when  every  one  of  his  neighbors  and  other  grow¬ 
ers  in  the  Northwest  receives  nearly  as  much  benefit  from  that 
advertising  as  the  man  who  pays  the  bill.  Advertising  must 
be  broad,  conservative,  intelligently  directed,  and  with  money 
enough  to  carry  it  on  a  large  scale.  This  can  be  done  only 
through  a  large  organization  representing  thousands  o£  indi¬ 
vidual  growers. 

Many  matters  of  legislation,  protection  of  the  orchard  in¬ 
dustry,  constructive  work  on  the  control  of  pests,  the  gather¬ 
ing  and  organizing  of  much  information  of  great  value  to  the 
growers,  such  as  Panama  Canal  rates,  effects,  desirability,  re¬ 
frigeration,  etc.,  can  not  be  handled  by  the  individual  grower. 
It  is  too  expensive  for  the  individual,  but  is  not  too  expensive 
when  conducted  by  a  big  organization  representing  thousands 
of  growers.  The  consignment  man,  the  cash  buyer,  the  in¬ 
dependent  dealer,  these  men  are  not  twelve  months  on  the  job 
tabulating  and  comparing  and  contrasting  district  with  dis¬ 
trict  and  bringing  a  wealth  of  information  to  the  individual 
grower  as  is  being  done  by  the  North  Pacific  Fruit  Distribu¬ 
tors,  with  its  6,000  members. 

Recently  Congress  proposed  to  prohibit  the  storage  of  ap¬ 
ples  longer  than  90  clays,  also  to  prohibit  storage  in  the  east 
ol  any  stock  that  had  already  been  stored  in  the  west.  Both 
of  these  provisions  would  have  brought  incalculable  harm  to 


30 


Rural  Life  Conference 


the  orchard  industry.  Six  thousands  growers,  through  the 
North  Pacific  Fruit  Distributors  (within  two  days  of  the  time 
their  letters  and  wires  reached  the  senators  and  representa¬ 
tives  from  the  four  northwestern  states)  secured  the  elimina¬ 
tion  of  these  two  undesirable  features  from  the  proposed  legis¬ 
lation.  In  like  manner  will  they  materially  aid  in  securing  at 
little  expense  to  the  growers  the  uniform  box  bill  that  the 
Northwest  has  so  long  wanted. 

As  an  individual  grower  I  do  not  have  the  power  that  is 
necessary  in  handling  successfully  any  large  industry.  Re¬ 
cently,  when  the  Illinois  Central  smashed  and  burned  ten  car¬ 
loads  of  peaches  in  one  trainload  between  St.  Louis  and  Chi¬ 
cago  for  the  North  Pacific  Fruit  Distributors,  it  recpiired  but 
ten  days  to  get  from  them  a  settlement  in  full  for  these  ten 
carloads  and  to  pass  the  same  on  to  the  growers.  Many  other 
illustrations  of  this  nature  I  could  give.  When  the  lack  of 
competitive  railways  in  a  little  Yakima  valley  was  used  by  a 
certain  railway  as  a  basis  for  an  excess  freight  charge  of  $16’ 
per  car  for  a  twelve-mile  haul,  the  assurance  on  our  part  (rep¬ 
resenting  other  sections  where  there  was  competition)  that 
fer  every  $16  collected  in  this  way  by  this  railroad,  said  rail¬ 
road  would  lose  five  carloads  of  freight,  totaling  $1,575,  that 
rightly  belonged  to  this  road,  but  would  be  diverted  to  other 
lines,  brought  the  elimination  of  this  $16  and  thus  saved  the 
growers  of  this  valley  approximately  $1,000  of  excess  freight 
charges  this  season.  And,  as  the  tonnage  of  this  valley  in¬ 
creases,  the  value  of  the  saving  will  proportionately  increase. 
There  are  many  other  illustrations  just  like  this  of  power 
through  organization  that  can  not  be  obtained  by  an  individual 
grower,  a  local  association,  an  independent  dealer,  a  commis¬ 
sion  man  or  a  cash  buyer. 

All  individual  growers  can  not  finance  themselves  with  a 
perishable  product  as  collateral  security.  But  this  present  year 
the  North  Pacific  Fruit  Distributors  and  its  allied  associations 
— thanks  to  good  inspection,  good  assembling  and  competent 
selling  facilities — have  made  a  perishable  product  a  basis  for 
stable  credit  for  nearly  one-half  million  dollars — every  cent  of 
which  was  paid  before  it  was  due.  And  though  I,  an  individual 


State  College  of  Washington 


31 


grower,  might  be  able  to  borrow  money  at  the  bank,  not  be¬ 
cause  of  my  fruit,  but  because  of  other  assets,  my  neighbor,  if 
riot  likewise  able  to  borrow,  is  forced  to  sell  his  fruit  at  a  sacri¬ 
fice  in  order  to  get  money,  and  he  thus  aids  in  lowering  the 

price  of  all  fruit,  and  consequently  that  of  every  other  grower. 

■ 

The  financing  side  then  is  an  important  one.  And,  through  co¬ 
operation  of  six  to  ten  thousand  growers,  a  lower  interest  rate 
Cali  be  secured  and  the  financing  can  be  better  handled  just  as 
the  city  in  its  bonding  system  can  secure  a  far  lower  rate  be- 
cause  of  its  larger  security  than  (-an  the  individual  grower  or 
citizen. 

Insurance  and  storage  are  likewise  vital  problems  that  I,  an 
individual  grower,  can  not  handle  to  the  best  advantage.  The 
railways  tell  us  that  they  can  not  carry  in  refrigerator  cars 
more  than  30,000  carloads  during  the  shipping  season.  If  this 
is  correct,  contracts  must  then  be  made  with  shipbuilding  con¬ 
cerns  to  handle  our  excess  tonnage  by  water,  or  storage  houses 
must  be  erected  and  maintained,  insurance  and  storage  for 
large  quantities  of  fruit  must  be  provided  for.  And  these 
things  I,  an  individual  grower,  can  not  do.  But  the  big  cen¬ 
tral  selling  organization  can  handle  these  affairs  wisely  and 
economically.  The  local  association,  or  the  little  independent 
buyer,  or  the  consignment  man  may  do  a  little  better  than  the 
individual  grower,  but  the  problem  is  too  big  for  them  just 
as  the  building  of  the  Panama  Canal  is  too  big  for  private 
capital  or  a  private  concern. 

It  seems  to  me  that  I  have  conclusively  proved  the  value  of 
a  big  selling  organization  over  the  individual  grower,  the  small 
organization  and  the  independent  or  consignment  concerns, 
^nd  the  big  organization,  through  the  economy  possible  by 
concentration,  and  through  its  better  selling  machine,  brings 
a  larger  net  return  to  the  individual  grower  than  he  can  ob¬ 
tain  year  in  and  year  out  on  an  average  for  all  of  his  product, 
than  is  the  case  with  any  other  of  these  various  organizations, 
But  if  these  things  were  not  true,  the  additional  advantages 
for  service  rendered  (as  I  have  outlined  above)  by  a  big  cen¬ 
tral  selling  agency  is,  itself,  worth  fifteen  to  twenty-five  cents 
per  box  to  the  individual  grower.  The  independent  buyer  and 


32 


Rural  Life  Conference 


the  consignment  man  are  not  forever  on  the  job  rendering  these 
srvices  as  is  the  big  organization  directly  representing  the 
grower. 

If  I  can  not  sell  my  own  product,  then  what  am  I  to  do? 
Shall  I  turn  it  over  on  consignment?  Automobile  manufac¬ 
turers  require  payment  in  cash  for  each  car  they  turn  over  to 
their  agents  to  sell.  Therefore  no  automobile  agent  cuts  the 
price  to  such  a  degree  that  there  is  loss  to  the  manufacturer. 
But  if  instead  of  requiring  cash  from  their  agents  the  manu¬ 
facturers  would  turn  over  their  automobiles  on  consignment 
and  send  great  quantities  indiscriminately  to  various  distribu¬ 
tive  centers  (as  has  previously  been  the  case  with  fruit),  and 
would  say  to  their  agents  '‘get  the  best  price  you  can  and  keep 
ten  per  cent  commission  for  making  the  sale,”  what  then  would 
happen?  Price-cutting  would  mean  merely  a  smaller  net 
commission  to  the  agent,  but  would  also  mean  increased  sales 
to  the  agent.  But  this  price-cutting  would  mean  net  loss  to 
the  manufacturer.  Now,  instead  of  automobiles,  substitute  a 
perishable  product  and  instead  of  a  few  wealthy  well-organ¬ 
ized  automobile  manufacturers  substitute  thousands  and  thou¬ 
sands  of  unorganized  growers  and  turn  their  product  over  on 
consignment  to  agents  they  can  not  check  upon  as  the  auto 
manufacturer  can  do  and  what  then  would  be  the  result?  Why, 
demoralization  of  course,  as  has  been  the  case  always  hereto¬ 
fore.  Therefore  I  do  not  want  to  turn  my  fruit  over  on  the 
consignment  plan  because  I  am  opposed  to  it  on  principle  other 
than  as  emergency  demands;  in  which  event  the  consignment 
man  has  his  place  and  is  performing  a  meritorious  service,  and 
I  am  opposed  to  it  because  it  makes  for  price-cutting  and  de¬ 
moralization. 

Anyway,  the  consignment  man  was  here  in  1912  and  his 
machinery  broke  down;  and  if  it  broke  down  in  1912  with  10 
per  cent  of  our  acreage  in  bearing,  what  can  I  hope  from  it 
wThen  one  hundred  per  cent  of  our  acreage  is  in  bearing? 

What  of  the  cash  buyer?  I  believe  in  him.  However,  when 
the  crop  is  short  he  is  here,  and  when  the  crop  is  heavy  he  is 
not  here.  And  frequently  he  changes  his  complexion  from  that 
of  a  cash  buyer  to  that  of  a  consignment  man.  Besides,  his 


State  College  of  Washington 


33 


machinery,  too,  broke  down  in  1912.  And  if  the  fruit  industry 
of  the  Northwest  is  put  upon  a  stable  basis  I  must  help  pro¬ 
vide  a  machine  so  big,  so  soundly  constructed,  so.  dependable, 
that  it  will  carry  the  load  when  we  have  one  hundred  and 
twenty-five  thousand  carloads  of  fruit  to  market  instead  of 
fifteen  thousand,  as  in  1912. 

Nothing  short  then  of  a  big  organization  representing  fifty 
or  more  per  cent  of  the  commercial  tonnage  of  the  Northwest 
will,  f  believe,  successfully  and  scientifically  market  the  fruit 
year  in  and  year  out  and  thus  preserve  our  orchard  industry. 
"Without  such  an  organization  there  will  be  chaos.  With  such 
an  organization,  rightly  manned  and  constructed  on  right 
principles,  there  will  be  order  and  a  preservation  of  our  in¬ 
dustry.  i. 

If  you  will  grant  me,  then,  that  a  big  organization  is  neces¬ 
sary,  the  one  remaining  question  for  a  fruit  grower  to  decide 
is:  “Do  I  want  a  cooperative  organization  owned  and  con¬ 
trolled  absolutely  by  the  growers  themselves,  and  in  their 
interests,  or  do  1  want  to  turn  it  over  to  an  independent,  pri¬ 
vate,  profit-making  business  concern,  which  in  most  instances 
is  controlled  outside  of,  and  away  from,  the  fruit  growing 
sections  of  the  Northwest,  and  is  owned  and  controlled  bv  men 
having  little,  if  any,  interest  at  all  in  the  business  or  growing 
side  of  the  Northwest,  and  in  some  instances  by  men  more 
largely  interested  in  eastern  barrelled  apples,  and  citrous 
fruits  and  bananas  V’  To  me  there  is  but  one  answer  to  this 

*  '  ;  J 

question.  The  independent  private  concern  will  tend  towards 
a  monopoly  like  that  of  the  banana  industry  in  which  the 
grower  is  absolutely  at  the  mercy  of  the  organization.  Even 
though  manned  and  controlled  at  the  present  time  by  men 
who  are  honest  and  men  who  are  capable,  it  may  eventually 
be  sold  to,  or  inherited  by,  men  who  are  neither  honest  nor 
capable. 

I  can  not  possibly  lend  my  assistance  then  to  the  organiza¬ 
tion  of  a  machine  that  mav  itself  be  entirelv  disinterested  in 

*  %j 

the  box-apple  business  and  in  time  may  hold  me  absolutely 
helpless  in  its  grasp.  For  if  it  is  a  big  private' oragnization 
marketing  apples,  citrus  fruits,  possibly  banana*,  barrelled 


34 


Rural  Life  Conference 


apples  and 'other  products,  if  it  can  not  make  the  money  it 
desires  to  make  on  the  box-apple  business,  having  no  financial 
interest  in  the  Northwest,  it  may  decline  to  handle  our  box 
apples,  and  without  question  may  substitute  bananas  or  citrus 
fruit  or  barrelled  apples.  It  does  not  care  if  the  box-apple 
business  goes  entirely  to  the  bow  wows.  In  other  words  its 
interest  in  the  box-apple  business  is  only  in  exploiting  it  for  its 
own  profit.  But  the  cooperative  association  is  owned  by  those 
who  grow  the  fruit,  and  the  vital  interest  of  the  cooperative 
association  is  in  preserving  the  fruit  industry  of  the  North¬ 
west.  It  can  make  money  for  its  members  only  by  economi¬ 
cally  and  properly  managing  the  sale  of  its  orchard  products. 
And  it  has  no  other  business  than  this  one  thing.  But  the  in¬ 
dependent  business  concern,  if  it  can  make  more  profit  on 
citrus  fruits  or  bananas  or  barrelled  apples,  will  naturally  sub¬ 
stitute  these  products  for  the  Northwest  box  apples,  and  there¬ 
fore  permit  the  apple  industry  in  this  territory  to  languish 
and  die. 

In  1912  every  known  type  of  selling  machine  in  the  four 
Northwestern  states  failed.  The  machine  that  most  nearly 
succeeded  was  that  one  which  happened  to  be  the  largest,  the 
one  built  015  a  co-operative  basis,  ami  the  one  manned  by  those 
who  are  important  factors  in  the  control  today  of  the  North 
Pacific  Fruit  Distributors.  And  the  organizations  that  more 
nearly  met  this  one  already  mentioned,  namely  the  Yakima 
Valley  Fruit  Growers’  Association,  were  those  most  nearly 
patterned  like  it  and  those  manned  by  the  most  experienced 
growers,  managers  and  sales  managers  of  the  Northwest, 
whose  officers  they  are  now  among  those  in  the  most  impor¬ 
tant  positions  with  the  North  Pacific  Fruit  Distributors. 

Moreover,  the  men  who  control  the  marketing  of  my  fruit 
I  want  to  be  bona  fide  apple  growers  looking  at  the  economical 
handling  and  price-making  from  the  same  angle  that  I,  a 
grower,  look  at  them. 

After  18  months  of  study  and  observation  as  an  officer  of 
the  North  Pacific  Fruit  Distributors  of  the  marketing,  and 
after  traveling  17,000  miles  investigating  as  well  as  possible 


State  College  of  Washington 


35 


from  first-hand  sources,  I  have  analyzed  this  question  as 
above,  and  can  reach  one  conclusion,  and  one  only,  viz:  That 
with  a  large  cooperative  organization,  owned  and  controlled 
by  the  growers  themselves,  run  in  the  growers’  own  interests, 
with  fifty  per  cent  or  more  of  the  commercial  output  of  the 
Aemriean  Northwest,  even  in  the  marketing  of  that  prospec¬ 
tive  125,000  carloads  of  apples  there  is  order  and  fair  profit, 
but  with  125,000  carloads  facing  us,  and  without  such  a  mar¬ 
keting  organization,  there  is  nothing  ahead  but  chaos.  Which 
it  shall  be,  the  growers  must  decide.  A  great  principle  is  at 
stake,  and  the  question  of  temporary  returns  here  and  there  is 
a  secondary  problem.  All  known  machinery  utterly  failed  in 

4 

1912.  With  ten  times  the  tonnage  of  1912  ahead  of  us,  the 
creation  of  a  capable,  efficient  marketing  machine  is  the  one 
vital  thing,  so  that  order  may  come  from  chaos  and  the  grower 
may  come  into  his  own. 

Can  the  northwestern  fruit  grower  successfully  combine  with 
his  fellows  in  building,  owning  and  controlling  his  own  selling 
machine?  The  Englishman  has  done  it  for  many,  many  years. 
The  Danish  farmer  handles  $90,000,000  a  year  through  his  co¬ 
operative  organizations,  and  receives  92  1-2  per  cent  of  the 
price  paid  by  the  consumer  for  the  farm  product.  The  French¬ 
man,  the  German  have  done  it,  as  has  the  citrus  grower  of 
California  and  of  Florida ;  the  dairyman,  the  potato  grower, 
the  truck  grower,  the  stock  breeder,  and  scores  of  other  very 

capably  managed  farmers’  organizations  in  various  parts  of 
Ihe  United  States.  In  fact,  50,000.000  farmers  scattered  over 
the  civilized  world  have  for  years  maintained  successful  co¬ 
operative  associations.  I  believe  there  is  no  more  intelligent 
farmer  in  the  whole  civilized  world  than  in  the  orchards  of  the 
Northwest.  Therefore  I  believe  to  the  most  profound  degree 
that  the  northwestern  fruit  grower  has  and  will  control  the 
sale  of  his  own  product  even  to  a  better  degree  than  has  been 
done  by  the  farmer  of  other  sections  of  this  or  other  countries. 


36 


Rural  Life  Conference 


THE  FARMER  AND  COOPERATION. 

L.  C.  Crow. 

j  •  * 

Organization  is  everywhere  manifested  in  nature,  both  in 
animate  and  in  inaninate  life,  from  the  tiny  grain  of  sand  be¬ 
neath  our  feet  up  through  all  creation  of  inanimate  being,  even 
to  the  ponderous  worlds  that  whirl  in  majesty  and  splendor 
to  adorn  the  starry  vaults  of  heaven  till  we  reach  the  climax 
of  our  creative  world  in  the  ponderous  globe  of  Jupiter,  we 
may  read  the  great  lesson  of  organization.  Man,  the  greatest 
of  all  creative  intelligence,  has  been  the  slowest  to  realize  this 
great  lesson,  but  the  time  has  now  come  and  in  this  20th  cen¬ 
tury  of  the  Christian  era,  he  has  begun  to  realize  that  he  must 
improve  the  golden  opportunity,  that  great  aggregation  of 
capital  and  great  accumulation  of  wealth  into  the  hands  of  the 
few,  mean  to  him  hopeless  struggle,  single  handed  and  alone ; 
that  if  the  rural  husbandman  holds  his  position  in  life  and  suc¬ 
ceeds  in  the  great  battle  for  existence,  he  must  organize  in 
order  to  be  able  to  cope  with  other  fields  of  industry  and  or¬ 
ganization. 

One  of  the  great  factors  of  organization  is  almost  entirely 
overlooked  by  farmers,  and  this  is  power.  There  are  today 
perhaps  about  5,000,000  farmers  organized  in  the  Farmers7 
Union,  The  Grange,  and  the  Society  of  Equity;  a  vast  army  of 
men  greater  than  all  the  combined  armies  of  the  Federal  army 
and  sufficiently  strong  to  commond  the  power,  respect  and 
admiration  of  the  civilized  world ;  an  army  strong  enough  to 
demand  any  just  and  equitable  measure  and  get  what  it  de¬ 
mands,  if  it  cooperates  and  agrees  on  what  it  wants. 

The  National  Country  Life  Commission  brought  out  this  fact 
prominently  and  one  of  its  recommendations  was  that  farmers 
needed  Organizations  to  put  them  in  a  position  where  they 
might  better  assist  themselves,  or  in  other  words  be  able  to 
meet  the  competitive  struggle.  If  the  question  be  asked  why 
the  farmers  need  be  organized  the  answer  is:  ‘‘Because  all 
other  industries  are  organized  for  the  purpose  of  protecting* 
the  capital  invested  in  their  industries.”  It  was  said  a  few 
years  ago  by  one  of  our  great  statesmen  that  all  of  our  in- 


State  College  of  Washington 


37 


dustries  were  organized  except  our  greatest  of  all  industries, 
that  of  agriculture.  .  ,  • 

It  has  been  estimated  that  about  one-third  of  the  entire 
country  is  engaged  directly  or  indirectly  in  agriculture,  pro¬ 
ducing  about  8  or  9  billions  of  wealth.  Yet  this  large  class  of 
men  that  is  so  important  to  society,  so  useful  to  civilization 
and  commercial  progress,  is  scarcely  holding  its  own  in  the 
great  competitive  struggle  that  is  constantly  going  on  in  the 
commercial  world.  All  for  want  of  organization.  The  farmer 
has  produced  enough  wealth  in  a  quarter  of  a  century  to  buy 
all  the  property  in  the  United  States,  and  yet  he  ip.  scarcely 
holding  his  own,  in  fact,  if  we  may  believe  statistics,  he  has 
been  losing  ground  financially,  for  twelve  years  ago  he  owned 
one-fourth  of  the  wealth  of  the  Nation  and  now  own, e:  but  one- 
fifth.  He  has  been  outgeneraled  in  the  battle  of  wits  and  has 
actually  been  losing  ground,  because  of  his  failure  do  get  to¬ 
gether,  stay  together,  and  hold  together.  ,  ; 

Professor  Spillman  says  the  average  farm  income  is  only 
$650  per  year,  and  out  of  this  the  average  farmer  must  clothe, 
feed,  and  educate  his  family,  or  in  other  words  lie1  is  workings 
long  hours  for  about  $1.00  per  day.  Thus  we  see  he  is  work¬ 
ing  himself  long  hours  and  paying  himself  scandalously  low 
wages,  which  can  be  largely  remedied  through  concrete,  effec¬ 
tive  organization. 

The  farmers  of  the  Old  World  passed  through  this1  same  evo¬ 
lutionary  period  from  individual  effort  to  that  of  organiza¬ 
tion  and  cooperation  many  years  ago.  The  farmers  of  Den¬ 
mark,  thirty  or  forty  years  ago,  were  in  a  deplorable  condi¬ 
tion.  Their  lands  were  depleted  and  impoverished  and  com¬ 
merce  was  destroyed  and  their  resources  exhausted,  but 
through  systematic  education  and  organization  they  have  made 
rapid  improvements.  Their  lands  are  now  producing  much 
more  than  in  any  former  period  of  their  existence,  Under  their 
methods  of  intensified  farming  and  under  organized  methods 
of  marketing  and  distribution  they  are  in  a  more  prosperous 
condition  than  in  any  time  of  their  history. 

The  farmers  of  Denmark  have  taken  their  place  among  the 
most  prosperous  and  progressive  of  the  world  and  all  because 


38 


Rural  Life  Conference 


of  their  cooperation  and  constructive  methods  of  economics 
and  industry  as  it  is  brought  about  by  organization.  The  Irish 
peasants  have  made  wonderful  progress  in  organization  under 
the  leadership  of  Sir  Horace  Plunket.  The  American  farmers 
are  making  great  progress  at  organizing  and  effective  coopera¬ 
tion  under  the  leadership  of  C.  S.  Barrett.  The  farmers  of 
Italy,  Germany,  France,  Belgium,  Scotland.  England  and 
other  European  countries  are  getting  together,  organizing  and 
getting  definite  results  from  organization. 

The  farmers  of  the  rural  districts  should  organize,  estab¬ 
lish  social  centers  and  discuss  better  living,  better  market¬ 
ing,  better  sociability,  and  better  citizenship.  They  will  foster 
education,  uproot  ignorance,  shorten  hours  and  lengthen  life, 
increase  independence  and  decrease  dependence,  develop  merit, 
decrease  selfishness,  reduce  prejudice,  and  induce  liberty, 
broaden  social  centers,  eliminate  classes,  lighten  toil,  and  cheer 
the  home,  bring  happiness  to  the  fireside.  They  will  soothe  the 
mother’s  heart  to  get  in  the  social  circle  of  the  organization 
and  spend  a  few  happy  hours  in  social  recreation,  enjoyment 
and  entertainment  with  her  neighbors.  Here  is  a  good  place  for 
the  children,  a  social  place  for  the  mothers  and  daughters  and 
a  business  place  for  the  fathers  and  sons. 


THE  SOCIAL  ASPECTS  OF  THE  COUNTRY  CHURCH. 

John  F.  Nicholson. 

The  subject  that  I  desire  to  discuss  is  the  social  aspect  of  the 
country  church.  There  are  a  few  prefatory  statements  that  I 
desire  to  make  as  statements  of  fact.  One  is  that  the  country 
church  is  responsive  to  every  stimulus  which  affects  the  country 
community.  Secondly,  the  country  church  has  always  expres¬ 
sed  and  measured  the  social  and  economic  prosperity  of  the 
community.  One  can  go  into  any  rural  community  and  byr 
determining  the  condition  of  the  country  church  ascertain  in 
a  large  measure  the  economic  and  social  welfare  of  the  country 
people.  There  are  many  communities  in  the  United  States 
where  the  religious  sentiment  has  been  so  strong  that  the  whole 


State  College  of  Washington 


39 


social  fabric  of  the  community  lias  been  woven  around  the 
church.  Let  me  cite  as  an  illustration  the  Quaker  community, 
the  Mennonites,  the  Mormon  districts,  those  communities  where 
the  Scotch-Irish  have  settled  in  large  numbers,  and  lastly  in 
some  sections  of  the  United  States  where  a  whole  community 
is  composed  of  a  religious  German  element.  In  all  of  these 
communities  one  finds  the  entire  social  conditions  completely 
overshadowed  by  the  church  of  those  communities. 

It  has  always  been  true  that  when  people  worship  together 
they  will  work  together.  For  this  reason,  a  church  organiza¬ 
tion  can  hold  a  community  together  better  than  a  club  or 
union.  There  is  a  certain  bond  of  fellowship  running  through 
the  church  organization  that  is  never  found  in  any  other  kind 
of  social  gathering.  For  this  reason  I  believe  that  the  social 
betterment  of  the  farming  communities  can  best  be  worked 
out  through  the  religious  organizations  or  the  so-called  church. 

Let  me  review  for  a  moment  the  social  types  found  among 
the  rural  populations  in  the  United  States.  We  have  first  of 
all  the  pioneer.  As  a  rule  the  pioneer  is  of  an  exclusive  na¬ 
ture.  He  is  a  lonely  type  of  man  and  the  religion  that  he  be¬ 
lieves  in  is  a  religion  of  personal  salvation.  The  second  type 
is  the  exploiter.  He  is  interested  in  developing  new  sections 
of  farm  land,  he  follows  the  pioneer  and  attempts  to  build  up 
rural  communities.  The  church  that  this  type  of  citizen  would 
found  would  be  a  giving,  a  building,  a  donating  Church.  I 
think  this  type  of  so-called  farmer  is  found  in  many  of  the 
new  sections  of  the  Northwest.  It  is  the  desire  of  the  exploiter 
or  builder  to  make  as  great  an  external  appearance  as  possi¬ 
ble.  And  the  church  becomes  a  conspicuous  object  from  a 
material  standpoint  in  the  community.  The  third  type  found  in 
the  United  States  is  the  hubandman  himself.  This  is  the  old- 
time  farmer  who  is  contented  to  remain  upon  his  acres,  rear 
his  children  under  the  best  social  conditions  possible  and  live 
to  see  the  day  when  his  sons  and  daughters  are  comfortably 
situated  on  farms  surrounding  his  own.  This  type  of  citizen 
builds  his  church  as  an  institutional  and  social  home,  and  it  is 
in  this  kind  of  a  rural  church  that  the  real  social  and  economic 
betterment  of  the  rural  community  must  find  its  solution. 


40 


Rural  Life  Conference 


As  we  look  over  tlie  history  of  the  agricultural  changes  or 
developments  in  the  United  States,  we  see  remnants  still  of 
each  period  through  which  the  agricultural  development  has 
passed.  Look  to  the  New  England  States  and  observe  still  the 
one-horse  farmer.  Look  to  the  old  south  where  the  small  acre 
farms  are  si  ill  worked  with  the  one  mule.  Coming  farther  west 
we  strike  the  Ohio  farmer  with  his  two-horse  farm,  and  still 
farther  west  the  Iowa  farmer  farming  his  land  with  a  four- 
horse  team,  while  the  Idaho  farmer  rides  the  gang  plow,  pulled 
by  eight  horses. 

In  considering  the  social  conditions  of  a  farming  community 
we  must  take  into  consideration  the  tenant,  the  laborers,  and 
the  owner.  No  system  of  social  betterment  can  be  successful 
where  the  so-called  marginal  people  are  not  taken  into  con¬ 
sideration.  By  marginal  people  I  mean  those  people  who  labor 
upon  the  farm,  shifting  rapidly  from  one  place  to  another,  such 
as  the  hired  man  and  the  hired  girl. 

Now,  in  looking  over  the  rapid  development  that  agriculture 
has  made  in  the  United  States,  I  fail  to  find  that  the  church 
has  adapted  itself  to  the  changed  conditions.  Country  services 
today  are  much  like  they  were  fifty  years  ago.  If  one  should 
step  from  an  old-time  class  meeting  or  prayer  meeting  that  our 
grandfather  attended  into  one  of  the  similar  meetings  of  today 
there  would  be  little  change.  In  other  words,  I  am  prepared  to 
say  that  the  church  is  behind  the  times  and  is  not  living  up  to 
its  opportunities. 

So  far  as  the  number  of  churches  is  concerned,  the  rural  dis¬ 
tricts  are  certainly  well  supplied,  and  I  am  prepared  to  say 
that  there  are  too  many  churches  in  the  country  today.  In- 
looking  over  some  reports  at  my  command  I  find  in  one  dis¬ 
trict  in  Pennsylvania  that  within  a  radius  of  four  miles  there 
are  twenty-four  different  churches,  and  a  half  mile  from  this 
point,  within  a  radius  of  three  miles,  there  are  sixteen  churches. 
It  seems  to  me  that  the  dogmatic  differences  represented  in 
these  various  denominations  indicate  no  deep-seated  social 
difference.  In  certain  parts  of  the  United  States  there  has 
been  brought  about  a  perfect  consolidation  of  the  various  de¬ 
nominations  represented  in  the  country  churches  and,  as  a  rule, 


State  College  of  Washington 


41 


I  find  that  where  schools  have  been  consolidated  there  is  apt 
to  be  a  union  of  churches.  Again  I  find  that  in  three  counties 
in  Indiana  there  are  as  many  as  41  denominations  represented 
in  the  rural  communities.  If  religion  was  to  be  measured  by 
the  number  of  organizations  these  three  Indiana  counties  would 
certainly  be  very  religious.  Why,  in  such  counties  as  this 
where  there  are  so  many  churches,  consolidated  schools  are  out 
of  the  question.  As  a  matter  of  fact  these  three  Indiana  coun¬ 
ties  have  only  one  consolidated  school,  only  twenty-five  per 
cent  of  their  roads  are  graveled  or  macadamized,  and,  what  is 
more  deplorable,  there  is  not  even  a  record  of  the  ministers  of 
these  three  counties  ever  having  workd  together  in  any  move¬ 
ment. 

So  long  as  the  church  is  considered  a  vehicle  of  eternal  sal¬ 
vation  just  so  long  shall  we  have  a  multitude  of  denominations, 
which  is,  as  someone  has  said,  the  scandal  of  Protestantism. 
Religion  is  the  result  of  social  experiences  and  not  personal. 

The  apathy  of  the  rural  church  today  certainly  can  not  be 
remedied  by  doctrinal  training.  Churches  must  be  united,  must 
be  the  center  of  the  social  life  of  the  community  in  order  to 
perform  the  function  that  they  should  perform  in  a  social  com¬ 
munity.  It  has  been  argued  that  the  country  school  can  be 
made  the  center  for  social  and  community  life  of  the  rural  dis¬ 
trict,  but  this  I  do  not  agree  with.  The  country  needs  a  fed¬ 
eration  of  all  the  betterment  forces  and  those  forces  are  best 
concentrated  and  drawn  together  and  made  to  operate  through 
the  church  organization.  The  country  schools  frequently  make 
it  impossible  for  a  real  community  spirit  to  be  fostered.  The 
boys  and  girls  are  taught  those  things  in  the  country  school, 
which  naturally  are  foreign  to  life  on  the  farm.  Why  not 
teach  farm  things  to  farm  boys  and  girls?  This  alone  will  cause 
a  concentration  of  the  community  spirit  which  can  be  worked 
out  in  the  larger  organization. 

There  is  no  doubt  that  the  dominating  institution  in  the 
country  today  is  the  church,  and  with  this  advantage  why  can 
not  she  perform  that  function  demanded  of  her  throughout  the 
United  States?  If  the  church  could  only  have  an  economic 
doctrine  and  recognize  that  she  has  as  great  a  work  to  per- 


42 


Rural  Life  Conference 


form  and.  the  same  kind  of  work  to  perform  as  that  of  Booker 
T.  Washington  among  the  negroes,  this  farm  betterment  ques¬ 
tion  would  be  largely  solved. 

Let  us  turn  our  attention  a  moment  to  some  of  the  factors 
operating  against  the  church  in  its  struggle  to  take  its  place 
as  a  social  and  economic  center  of  a  community.  The  country 
minister  has  no  training  for  the  work  he  is  to  perform.  Our 
seminaries  are  training  men  for  sky  pilots  and  not  for  leader¬ 
ship  among  men.  The  young  minister  who  desires  a  life  work 
that  will  reap  the  largest  amount  of  satisfaction  had  better 
turn  his  face  towards  the  country  community,  for  there  he  will 
find  a  field  for  original  investigation. 

The  preacher  who  accepts  a  call  to  the  country  church  in 
these  times  is  handicapped  from  the  beginning  because  he  has 
accepted  that  call.  The  community  at  once  begins  to  wonder 
what  it  was  that  caused  him  to  leave  the  city  for  a  country 
charge.  I’ll  tell  you  the  church  must  raise  its  estimate  of  it¬ 
self.  The  country  church  is  handicapped  again  by  the  lack 
of  leadership  in  the  country.  The  city  has  called  the  best  men 
and  the  farmers  remaining  in  the  community  are  generally  un¬ 
progressive,  much  alike  in  their  thoughts,  and  have  no  com¬ 
munity  experiences  where  all  can  get  together.  This  condition 
engenders  the  type  of  suspicion  which  makes  it  almost  impos¬ 
sible  for  any  one  man  to  assume  any  semblance  of  leadership. 
Among  fifty  agricultural  communities  that  I  have  taken  pains 
to  look  up,  there  were  only  two  that  had  anything  like  a  leader. 
I  therefore  plead  for  rural  leaders.  G.  F.  Wells  says  “  Personal 
leadership  is  the  most  important  question  today.” 

Now,  in  closing,  I  wish  I  could  refer  you  to  the  report  of  the 
work  of  Matthew  B.  McNutt  in  DuPage  county,  Illinios.  His 
work  in  that  county  is  a  wonderful  revelation  of  what  can  be 
done  by  a  man  who  will  seize  his  opportunities  and  apply  them 
to  the  betterment  of  the  social  and  economic  welfare  of  the 
rural  people.  I  wish  I  had  time  to  tell  you  of  how  this  young 
minister  of  the  gospel,  absolutely  unfitted  for  the  task,  assumed 
unwillingly  the  duties  of  pastor  of  a  country  church,  and  how, 
by  use  of  native  leadership  ability,  welded  that  whole  com¬ 
munity  into  one  compact  body  and  made  the  church  the  abso- 


State  College  of  Washington 


43 


lute  social  center  of  that  district.  The  story  of  his  work  reads 
like  fiction,  but  it  demonstrates  that  there  is  not  a  rural  neigh¬ 
borhood  in  this  country  that  can  not  be  organized  for  its  up¬ 
building  by  somebody,  by  some  method,  by  some  activity  of 
general  interest.  People  today  have  as  great  spiritual  aspira¬ 
tions  as  ever,  but  the  appeal  must  be  made  in  terms  of  every 
day  life. 


# 


FIRST  RURAL  LIFE  CONFERENCE. 

The  State  College  of  Washington,  June  18-19-20,  1913. 


PROGRAM  OF  EXERCISES. 


Wednesday,  June  18,  1:  30  to  3:30  p.  m. 

SURVEY  OF  RURAL  LIFE  CONDITIONS  AND  INSPEC¬ 
TION  OF  EXHIBITS. 

Chairman,  President  E.  A.  Bryan,  Washington  State  College, 

1:30  to  2:00  p.  in.  Plan  and  Purpose  of  the  Survey. 

Professor  E.  R.  Groves,  State  College  of  New  Hampshire. 

2  :00  to  2  :30  p.  m.  Value  of  the  Survey  to  Business  Interests. 
Edwin  T.  Coman,  Cashier  Exchange  National  Bank,  Spokane. 

2:20  to  2.40  p.  m.  Religious  Surveys. 

Reverend  Carl  Veazie,  lone,  Washington. 

2:40  to  3:30  p.  m.  Educational  Surveys. 

Mrs.  Josephine  Preston,  State  Superintendent  of  Public  In¬ 
struction,  State  of  Washington. 

3  :00  to  3  :30  p.  m.  General  discussion  Surveys,  open  to  all. 

3  :30  to  5  :00  p.  m.  Inspection  of  Exhibits. 

Pure  Food. 

Farm  Power  and  Machinery. 

Lighting  Plants. 

Sewage  Disposal. 

Farm  and  Household  Pests. 

Textiles. 

Bacteriological. 

8:30  p.  m.  Reception  to  Summer  Session  Students  and  Visitors 
and  Guests  of  the  onferenee,  the  Armory. 


State  College  of  Washington  45 

Thursday,  June  19,  8:30  to  12:00  m. 

THE  ECONOMICS  OF  AGRICULTURE. 

Chairman,  Acting  President  Carlyle,  University  of  Idaho. 

8  :35  to  9  :00  a.  m.  Farm  Finance. 

Hon.  M.  E.  Hay  of  Spokane. 

Discussion. 

9  :10  to  9  :35  a.  m.  Co-operation  in  Marketing. 

H.  C.  Sampson,  Secretary  North  Pacific  Fruit  Growers’  Assn. 

Discussion. 

9:45  to  10:10.  The  Farmers’  Educational  and  Cooperative 
Union. 

Hon.  J.  L.  Brislawn,  Davenport,  Washington. 

10:20  to  10:45.  The  Grange. 

C.  B.  Kegley,  Master  of  the  Washington  State  Grange. 

11:00  to  11:25.  Relation  of  Chambers  of  Commerce  to  Rural 
Communities. 

C.  C.  Chapman,  President  Portland  Chamber  of  Commerce. 
Discussion. 

11:35  to  12:00  m.  The  Bankers’  Part  in  Rural  Development. 
J.  J.  Rouse,  Cashier  Fidelity  National  Bank,  Spokane. 

Thursday  Afternoon,  1:30  to  3:30. 

DISCUSSION  OF  SOCIAL  CENTERS. 

Chairman,  David  Brown,  Chairman  Country  Life  Committee 
of  Washington. 

Mrs.  Josephine  Preston,  Olympia,  Washington. 

Rev.  Ohas.  McCaughey,  Spokane.  Washington. 

Mr.  C.  O.  Button,  Bellingham.  Washington. 


General  Discussion. 


46 


Rural  Life  Conference 


Thursday  Evening,  8:15  p.  m. 

Chairman,  Hon.  R.  C.  McCroskey,  Garfield,  Washington. 
Social  Aspect  of  the  Church. 

Professor  J.  F.  Nicholson,  University  of  Idaho,  Moscow, 
Idaho. 


Friday  Morning,  8 :30  a.  m. 

Social  Agencies  for  Rural  Betterment. 

Chairman,  Rev.  John  M.  Matthews,  Seattle,  Washington. 
The  Rural  Church.  W.  J.  Hindley,  Spokane,  Washington. 
Discussion/ 

Church  Organization  and  Efficiency. 

Rev.  Harley  Jackon,  Columbus,  Indiana. 

Discussion., 

The  Rural  Schools. 

(a)  The  High  School  and  the  Community. 

Superintendent  C.  W.  Hodge,  Snohomish,  Washington. 

(b)  School  Consolidation. 

Mrs.  Josephine  Preston,  Olympia,  Washington. 

(c)  School  Supervision. 

J.  C.  Muerman,  attache  of  the  Federal  Department  of 
Education,  Salem,  Oregon. 


RURAL  LIFE  CONFERENCE  OF  1914. 


The  second  Rural  Life  Conference  of  the  State  College  of 
Washington  will  take  place  during  three  days  from  June  30  to 
July  2,  1914.  As  was  the  case  last  summer  this  conference  will 
attempt  to  consider  some  of  the  manifold  phases  of  Rural  Life, 
with  especial  reference  to  conditions  in  the  Northwest,  and 
particularly  in  Washington. 

While  following  the  general  lines  of  the  previous  conference 
the  experience  of  the  earlier  sessions  has  led  to  a  modification 
which  will  result  in  a  somewhat  greater  emphasis  being  laid  on 
certain  practical  features  of  country  life.  The  morning  ses¬ 
sions  of  the  three  days  will  be  devoted  to  prepared  papers  on 
such  subjects  as  the  social  aspects  of  country  life,  with  atten¬ 
tion  to  existing  and  potential  social  agencies,  such  as  the  school, 
the  church,  and  social  centers  apart  from  these  two  institutions ; 
the  economic  side  of  rural  life,  including  consideration  of  the 
financial  situation,  touching,  among  other  matters,  the  probable 
effects  of  the  new  currency  bill,  the  rural  credit  question,  with 
a  review  of  the  rural  credit  bill  now  pending;  marketing,  and 
other  aspects  of  the  problem  of  getting  a  living  in  the  country. 
There  will  be  time  devoted  to  some  of  the  pathological  aspects 
of  rural  groups,  including  such  social  problems  as  poverty  and 
pauperism,  crime,  defectiveness,  etc.  In  addition  to  the  pre¬ 
pared  papers  there  will  be  discussions  in  open  meeting  and 
round-table  conferences. 

The  afternoons  will  be  devoted  exclusively  to  the  practical 
side.  There  will  be  exhibits,  accompanied  by  demonstrations, 
related  to  home,  farm  and  rural  town  life,  including  home  man¬ 
agement,  home  decoration,  beautification  of  grounds  of  home, 
church  and  school ;  sanitation  in  the  home  and  on  the  farm  will 
also  form  a  part  of  this  feature.  In  addition  to  these  there  are 
to  be  arranged  demonstrations  in  stock  judging,  poultry  rais¬ 
ing,  soil  testing,  seed  testing,  and  the  like.  Exhibits  and  dem¬ 
onstrations  of  application  of  mechanical  power  in  the  home  and 
on  the  farm  will  afford  no  small  part  of  the  interest  of  this 
side  of  the  conference. 

The  evening  sessions  are  each  to  be  given  up  to  one  or  two 


48 


Rural  Life  Conference 


lectures  on  some  of  the  special  features  of  the  Conference,  and 
for  these  formal  presentations  some  of  the  strongest  speakers- 
of  the  Conference  will  be  secured. 

In  addition  to  the  staff  of  the  Summer  Session  and  the  addi¬ 
tional  staff,  of  the  two  weeks  Ministers’1  course,  the  time  of 
which  coincides  in  part  with  the  Conference,  special  speakers 
are  to  be  secured.  Among  those  who  have  already  engaged 
to  be  present  is  Dr.  Ernest  H.  Linclley  of  the  University  of 
Indiana. ;  !  Mr.  Ralph  Felton  of  New  York,  who  will  have 
charge  of  the  ministerial  work  and  who  has  spent 
many  years  in  rural  survey  work,  will  be  one  of  the  most  help¬ 
ful  contributors  to  the  Conference.  Men  and  women  prominent 
in  social  !ahd  educational  work  in  the  Northwest  will  add  to  the 
value  of  the  sessions. 

All  of  those  men  and  women  who  are  interested  in  the 
vital  phases  of  rural  life  and  who  are  working  and  desire  to 
work  in  a  constructive  way  should  receive  both  practical  help 
and  renewed  enthusiasm  from  attendance  at  the  Conference. 


COURSES  OFFERED  IN  THE  SUMMER  SESSION  OF  1914 


Agriculture — Soil  Physics,  Field  Crops,  Types  and  Breeds 
of  Farm  Animals,  Principles  of  Feeding,  Principles  of  Breed¬ 
ing,  Poultry  Management,  Farm  Dairying,  Methods  of  Teach¬ 
ing  Agriculture,  Soils  and  Crops,  Livestock.  ;  -  i:'  ■ 

Botany — General  Botany,  Taxonomy,  Pathology,  ■  Bac¬ 
teriology,  Ecology,  Research,  Methods  of  Teaching  Botany. 

Chemistry — Experimental  Chemistry,  Qualitative  Analysis, 
Quantative  Analysis.  ..  , 

Economics  and  Sociology — Agricultural  EcononiicS,  General 
Economics,  Social  Problems.  .  ... 

Two  Weeks  Course  for  Ministers — Rural  Sociology,  Re¬ 
ligious  Pedagogy. 

Education — School  Law,  Psychology,  History  of  Education, 
Adolescence,  Ethics,  Social  Psychology. 

English — Teachers’  Course,  Rhetoric  and  Composition,  Ex¬ 
position,  Introduction  to  English  Literature,  Debate,  Shakes¬ 
peare,  American  Literature. 

Fine  Arts — Teachers’  Art  Course,  Home  Decoration,  Free 
Hand  Drawing. 

History — Development  of  the  Northwest,  Teachers’  Course, 
Oriental  and  Greek  History. 

Home  Economics — Foods  and  Nutrition,  Textiles  and  Cloth¬ 
ing,  Household  Management,  Teachers’  Course,  Elementary 
Cooking,  Elementary  Sewing. 

Horticulture — General  Horticulture,  Vegetable  Gardening, 
Propagation  of  Plants,  Plant  Growth  and  Culture. 

Latin — Teachers’  Course,  Beginning  Latin,  Cicero  and  Sal¬ 
lust,  Vergil.  «  ; 

Manual  Arts  and  Drawing — Freehand  Drawing,  Con¬ 
structive  Design,  Sloyd,  Elementary  Woodworking,  Cabinet 


50 


Rural  Life  Conference 


Making,  Teachers’  Course,  Instrument  Making,  Metal  Work  in 
Shops,  Art  Metal  Work. 

Mathematics — College  Algebra,  Trigonometry,  Calculus, 
Differential  Equations,  Teachers’  Course,  Elementary  Algebra, 
Plane  Geometry,  Solid  Geometry. 

Modern  Languages — Beginning  French,  Beginning  German, 
Reading  and  Conversation,  Scientific  German,  Conversation 
Course,  Teachers’  Course. 

Music — Pianoforte  Playing,  Organ  Playing,  Music  Appreci¬ 
ation,  Sight  Singing. 

i 

Oral  Expression — Public  Speaking,  Dramatics,  Reading 
Aloud. 

Photography. 

Athletics  and  Physical  Education — 

For  Men  :  Folk  Dances  and  Games,  The  Theory  and  Tech¬ 
nique  of  Coaching,  Training  and  First  x\id,  Swimming,  Tennis. 

For  Women :  German  and  Swedish  Calisthenics,  Play 
Ground  Games,  Coaching,  Tennis,  Swimming. 

Physics — Physics  for  Non-Engineering  Students,  General 
Physics,  Teachers’  Course,  Elementary  Physics. 

Physiology — General  Physiology,  Elementary  Physiology. 

Review  Courses  for  Examination — Arithmetic,  Drawing, 
Geography,  Grammar,  United  States  History,  Literature,  Music, 
Nature  Study,  Physical  Geography,  Physics,  Physiology,  Read¬ 
ing,  State  Manual,  Theory  and  Art  of  Teaching. 

Industrial  Courses  for  Rural  Teachers — Elementary  Agri¬ 
culture,  Elementary  Sewing,  Elementary  Cooking,  Plant 
Growth  and  Culture,  Manual  Training. 

Zoology— Introductory  Zoology,  Bird  Life,  Economic  Ento¬ 
mology. 


r 


State  College  of  Washington 

LECTURES 


51 


Single  Lectures 

June  17- — Opening  Address . President  E.  A.  Bryan 

•tune  18 — Organ  Recital . Dr.  Ernst  A.  Evans 

•June  22 — The  Development  of  Civic  Consciousness.. 

Dr.  Isaac  N.  M eCash,  President,  Spokane  University 

d  vine  28-— The  Customs,  People,  and  Natural  Re¬ 
sources  of  Hawaii . Professor  Elton  Fulmer 


•June  25— Subject  to  announced . Professor  Ralph  Fenton 

dune  29 — Robert  Owen  and  the  New  Harmony  Ex¬ 
periment . President  E.  A.  Bryan 

•Tune  30 — The  Dormant  Powers  of  Men.  .Dr.  Ernest  II.  Bindley 

•July  2 — Organ  Recital . Dr.  Ernst  A.  Evans 

duly  6— Rural  Surveys . Mrs.  Josephine  Preston 

State  Superintendent  of  Public  Instruction 

duly  7— The  Mystery  of  Dreams . Dr.  Ernest  H.  Bindley 

•July  9 — Sex  Hygiene . Dr.  Ira  D.  Cardiff 

July  13 — Subject  to  be  announced . Dr.  Edward  0.  Sisson 

Commissioner  of  Education  of  State  of  Idaho 

duly  14 — The  New  Pioneers . Dr.  Ernest  IT.  Bindlev 

duly  16— The  Source  and  Function  of  Daughter.... 

. Dr.  Frank  F.  Potter 

duly  20 — Books:  Their  Relation  to  Happiness  arid 

Culture . 'Rev.  dolm  AY.  Caughlan 

duly  21 — Organ  Recital . Dr.  Ernst  A.  Evans 


Serial  Lectures 


Rural  Schools  . (two  lectures) . June  22.  28 

Professor  J.  B.  Dumas,  of  the  State  Dept,  of  Education 


52 


Rural  Life  Conference 


Architectural  Styles  and  Famous  Buildings,  four  illus¬ 
trated  lectures . June  30,  July  7,  14,  21 

June  30,  Egyptian  and  Asiatic;  July  7,  Greek  and 
Roman;  July  14,  Romanesque,  Byzantine,  and  Gothic; 

July  21,  Renaissance  and  Modern. 

Rudolph  Weaver,  Professor  of  Architecture  and 
Architect  to  the  College 

The  Expansion  of  the  American  People . July  6,  13,  20 

A  series  of  three  illustrated  lectures 
Professor  Leroy  F.  Jackson  of  the  Department  of 

Economic  Science  and  Historv 

*/ 

Writers  of  American  Fiction . June  24,  July  1,  8,  15,  22 

June  24 — Early :  Charles  Brockden  Brown,  etc. 

July  1 — Romantic:  Irving,  Hawthorne,  Poe.  July  8 — 
Local  Color:  Bret  Ilarte,  Mark  Twain,  G.  AY.  Cable. 

July  15 — Realist:  Howells  and  James.  July  22 — 
Sociological:  Edith  Wharton,  Robert  Herrick,  Mar¬ 
garet  Deland. 

Professor  Stephen  Faunce  Sears  of  the  Depart¬ 
ment  of  English 


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’ 


